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Prepared by the Editor of Little Classics 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEISTD 


BY 


CHARLES DICKENS 

• » 


CONDENSED 

BY 


ROSSITER JOHNSON 



. ii S ' SOx 

\s 

‘ ‘ The library of Osbaldistone 
Hall was a gloomy room, whose antique 
oaken shelves bent beneath the weight of the 
ponderous folios so dear to the seventeenth cen- 
tury, from which, under favor be it spoken, we have dis- 
tilled matter for our quartos and octavos, and which, once 
more subjected to the alembic, may, should our 
sons be yet more frivolous than ourselves, be 
still farther reduced into duodecimos 
and pamphlets.” — Rob Roy. 


Copyright, 1876, 
By Henry Holt. 


John F. Trow & Son, 
printers, New York. 


Stereotyped by B, Hermon Smith, 
The UniYerity Press, Ithaca, N. Y. 


EXPLANATORY. 


This series of Condensed Classics is not intended to raise 
the question whether the works shall be read in tliis edition 
or in a complete one, but to meet the question already exist- 
ing, whether, in many cases, they shall be read in some such 
edition as this, or not read at all The list of “ books that 
everybody talks about and nobody reads ” is, in this hurried 
age, growing with a rapidity that imphes widespread igno- 
rance regarding much of what is best in our literary heritage. 
It is in the hope of diminishing this ignorance, not of increas- 
ing it, of securing for the condensed editions many readers 
who would never attack the complete ones, that this series 
is begun. 

Very few actually read every paragraph of a long novel, 
whatever may be their conventional notions about having it 
complete on their shelves ; and of those who do, many, it 
seems to me, might be glad to re-read, in a condensation 
which preserves every dramatic element, those romances 
which once gave them pleasure, but which are now forbid- 
den fruits, because of the serious consideration of time. Yet 
I would not have this edition criticised as if it professed to be 
an absolute improvement of the novels, but rather as a spe- 
cies of dramatization. Every word, with the exception of a 
few connecting clauses, is the author’s own; and I believe 
that in no case has anything been omitted which helps on the 
story or is necessary to the delineation of a character or the 
graphic portrayal of a scene. 


2 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


his boat, still there was business-like usage in his steady gaze. 
So with every hthe action of the girl, with every turn of her 
wrist, perhaps most of all with her look of dread or horror ; 
they were things of usage. 

“ Keep her out, Lizzie. Tide runs strong here. Keep her 
well afore the sweep of it.” 

A slant of light from the setting sun glanced into the bot- 
tom of the boat, and, touching a rotten stain there which bore 
some resemblance to the outline of a muffled human form, 
colored it as though with diluted blood. This caught the 
girl’s eye, and she shivered. 

“ What ails you ? ” said the man, immediately aware of it, 
though intent on the waters ; “ I see nothing afloat.” 

After a darkening hour or so, suddenly the rudder lines 
tightened and he steered hard towards the Surrey shore. 

Always watching his face, the girl instantly answered to 
the action in her sculling ; presently the boat swung round, 
quivered as from a sudden jerk, and the upper half of the man 
was stretched out over the stern. 

The girl pulled the hood of a cloak she wore, over her head 
and over her face, and, looking backward, so that the front 
folds of this hood were turned down the river, kept the boat 
in that direction going before the tide. The boat had hover- 
ed about one spot ; but now the banks changed swiftly, and 
the deepening shadows and the kindling lights of London 
Bridge were passed, and the tiers of shipping lay on either 
hand. 

It was not until now that the upper half of the man came 
back into the boat. His arms were wet and dirty, and he 
washed them over the side. In his right hand he held some- 
thing, and he washed that in the river too. It was money. 
He chinked it once, and he blew upon it once, and he spat 
upon it once, — “ for luck,” he hoarsely said — before he put it 
in his pocket. 

‘‘ Lizzie ! ” 

The girl turned her face toward him with a start, and 
rowed in silence. Her face was very pale. He was a hook- 
nosed man, and with that and his bright eyes and bis ruffled 
head, bore a certain hkeness to a roused bird of prey . 

Take that thing off your face.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


3 


She put it back. 

Here ! and give me hold of the sculls. I’ll take the rest 
of the spell.” 

“ Ho, no, father ! Ho ! I can’t indeed. Father ! — I can- 
not sit so near it! ” 

What hurt can it do you ? ” 

“ Hone, none. But I cannot bear it.” 

“ It’s my belief you hate the sight of the very river.” 

“ I — I do not like it, father.” 

As if it wasn’t your living I As if it wasn’t meat and 
drink to you I ” 

At these latter words the girl shivered again, and for a mo- 
ment paused in her rowing, seeming to turn deadly faint. It 
escaped his attention, for he was glancing over the stern at 
something the boat had in tow. 

“ How can you be so thankless to your best friend, Lizzie ? 
The very fire that warmed you when you were a babby, was 
picked out of the river alongside the coal barges. The very 
basket that you slept in, the tide washed ashore. The very 
rockers that I put it upon to make a cradle of it, I cut out of a 
piece of wood that drifted from some ship or another.” 

Lizzie took her right hand from the scull it held, and 
touched her lips with it, and for a moment held it out loving- 
ly towards him ; then, without speaking, she resumed her 
rowing, as another boat of similar appearance, though in 
rather better trim, came out from a dark place and dropped 
softly alongside. 

“ In luck again, G-affer ? ” said a man with a squinting leer, 
who sculled her and who was alone. “ I know’d you was in 
luck again, by your wake as you come down.” 

“ Ah 1 ” replied the other. “ So you’re out, are you ? ” 

“ Yes, pardner.” 

There was now a tender yellow moonlight on the river, 
and the new-comer, keeping hah his boat’s length astern of 
the other boat, looked hard at its track. 

“ I says to myself,” he went on, “ directly you hove in 
view. Yonder’s G-afFer, and in luck again, by George if he 
ain’t! Scull it' is, pardner — don’t fret yourseK — I didn’t 
touch him.” This was an answer to a quick impatient move- 
ment on the part of Gaffer ; the speaker at the same time un- 


4 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


shipping his scull on that side, and laying his hand on the 
gunwale of G-afFer’s boat and holding to it. 

He’s had touches enough not to want no more, as well as 
I make him out, GralFer! Been a-knocking about with a 
pretty many tides, ain’t he, pardner ? Such is my out-of- 
luck ways, you see ! He must have passed me when he 
went up last time, for I was on the look-out below bridge 
here. I a’most think you’re like the wulturs, pardner, and 
scent ’em out.” 

He spoke in a dropped voice with more than one glance at 
Lizzie, who had pulled on her hood again. Both men then 
looked with a weird interest at the wake of Gaffer’s boat. 

Easy does it, betwixt us. Shall I take him aboard, pard- 
ner ? ” 

‘‘No,” said the other. In so surly a tone that the man, af- 
ter a blank stare, acknowledged it with the retort : 

“ — Arn’t been eating nothing as has disagreed with you, 
have you, pardner ? ” 

“ Why, yes, I have,” said Gaffer. “ I have been swallow- 
ing too much of that word, Pardner. I am no pardner of 
yours.” 

“ Since when was you no pardner of mine. Gaffer Hexam 
Esquire ? ” 

“ Since you was accused of robbing a man. Accused of 
robbing alive man I ” said Gaffer, with great indignation. 

“ And what if I had been accused of robbing a dead man. 
Gaffer?” 

“You couldn’t do it.” 

“ Couldn’t you, Gaffer ? ” 

“No. Has a dead man any use for money ? Is it possible 
for a dead man to have money ? What world does a dead 
man belong to ? T’other world. What world does money 
belong to ? This w’orld. How can money be a corpse’s ? 
Can a corpse own it, want it, spend it, claim it, miss it? 
Don’t try to go confounding the rights and wrongs of things 
in that way. But it’s worthy of the sneaking spirit that robs 
alive man.” 

“ I will tell you what it is — ” 

“ No you won’t, /’ll tell you what it is. Y ou’ve got off 

with a short time of it for putting your hand in the pocket of 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


5 


a sailor, alive sailor, but don’t think after that to come over 
me with your pardners. We have worked together in time 
past, but we work together no more in time present nor yet 
future. Let go. Castoff!” 

“ Graflfer I If you think to get rid of me this way — ” 

‘‘ If I don’t get rid of you this way. I’ll try another, and 
chop you over the fingers with the stretcher, or take a pick at 
your head with a boat-hook. Cast off I Pull you, Lizzie. 
Pull home, since you won’t let your father pull.” 

Lizzie shot ahead, and the other boat fell astern. 

CHAPTER II. 

M e. AHD MRS. YENEERHSTGr were bran-new people 
in a bran-new house in a bran-new quarter of London. 
Everything about the Veneerings was spick and span new. 
All their furniture was new, and in a state of high varnish and 
polish. And what was observable in the furniture, was ob- 
servable in the Y eneerings — the surface smelled a little too 
much of the workshop and was a trifle sticky. 

There was an innocent piece of dinner-furniture that went 
upon easy castors and was kept over a livery stable-yard in 
Duke Street, St. James’s, when not in use, to whom the Ye- 
neerings were a source of blind confusion. The name of 
this article was Twemlow. Being first cousin to Lord Snigs- 
worth, he was in frequent requisition, and at many houses 
might be said to represent the dining-table in its normal 
state. 

The abyss to which he could find no bottom, and from 
which started forth the engrossing and ever-swelling diffi- 
culty of his life, was the insoluble question whether he was 
Yeneering’s oldest friend, or newest friend. 

This evening the Y eneerings give a banquet. 

The great looking-glass above the sideboard reflects the 
table and the company. Reflects the new Yeneering crest, 
in gold and eke in silver, frosted and also thawed, a camel of 
all wmrk. The Herald’s College found out a Crusading an- 
cestor for Yeneering who bore a camel on his shield (or 
might have done it if he had thought of it), and a caravan of 
camels take charge of the fruits and flowers and candles, and 


6 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


kneel down to be loaded with the salt. Eeflects Y eneering ; 
forty, wavy -haired, dark, tending to corpulence, sly, myste- 
rious, filmy — a kind of sufficiently well-looking veiled proph- 
et, not prophesying. Reflects Mrs. Y enering ; fair, aqui- 
line-nosed and fingered, not so much light hair as she might 
have, gorgeous in raiment and jewels, enthusiastic, propitia- 
tory, conscious that a corner of her husband’s veil is over 
herself. Reflects Podsnap ; prosperously feeding, two little 
light-colored wiry wings, one on either side of his else bald 
head, looking as like his hairbrushes as his hair, dissolving 
view of red beads on his forehead, large allowance of crum- 
pled shirt-collar up behind. Reflects Mrs. Podsnap ; fine 
woman for Professor Owen, quantity of bone, neck and nos- 
trils like a rocking-horse, hard features, majestic headdress 
in which Podsnap has hung golden offerings. Reflects 
Twemlow ; gray, dry, polite, susceptible to east wind, Pirst- 
Gentleman-in-Europe collar and cravat, cheeks drawn in as 
if he had made a great effort to retire into himself some years 
ago, and had got so far and had never got any farther. Re- 
flects mature young lady ; raven locks, and complexion that 
lights up well when well powdered — as it is — carrying on 
considerably in the captivation of mature young gentleman ; 
with too much nose in his face, too much ginger in his 
whiskers, too much torso in his waistcoat, too much sparkle 
in his studs, his eyes, his buttons, his talk, and his teeth. Re- 
flects charming old Lady Tippins on Y eneering’ s right ; with 
an immense obtuse drab oblong face, like a face in a table 
spoon, and a dyed Long W alk up the top of her head, as a 
convenient public approach to the bunch of false hair behind, 
pleased to patronize Mrs. Yeneering opposite, w'ho is pleased 
to be patronized. Reflects a certain “ Mortimer,” another of 
Yeneering’s oldest friends ; who never was in the house be- 
fore, and appears not to want to come again, who sits dis- 
consolate on Mrs. Y eneering’s left, and who was inveigled 
by Lady Tippins (a friend of his boyhood) to come to these 
people’s and talk, and who won’t talk. Reflects Eugene, 
friend of ^lortimer ; buried alive in the back of his chair, 
beliind a shoulder — with a powder-epaulette on it^ — of the 
mature young lady, and gloomily resorting to the cham- 
pagne chalice whenever proffered by the retainer who goes 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


7 


around like a gloomy Analytical Chemist. Lastly, the look- 
ing-glass reflects Boots and Brewer, and two other stuffed 
Buffers interposed between the rest of the company and pos- 
sible accidents. 

The Yeneering dinners are excellent dinners — or new 
people wouldn’t come — and all goes well. 

Now, Mortimer,” says Lady Tippins, rapping the sticks 
of her closed green fan upon the knuckles of her left hand — 
which is particularly rich in knuckles, I insist upon your 
telling all that is to be told about the man from J amaica.” 

(Jive you my honor I never heard of any man from Ja- 
maica, except the man who was a brother,” replied Morti- 
mer. 

Tobago, then.” 

‘‘ Nor yet from Tobago.” 

Now, my dear Mrs. Veneering,” quoth Lady Tippins, “ I 
appeal to you whether this is not the basest conduct ever 
known in this world ? I carry my lovers about, two or three 
at a time, on condition that they are very obedient and de- 
voted ; and here is my old lover-in-chief, the head of all my 
slaves, throwing off his allegiance before company ! ” 

A grisly little fiction concerning her lovers is Lady Tip- 
pins’s point. She is always attended by a lover or two, and 
she keeps a little list of her lovers, and she is always booking 
a new lover, or striking out an old lover, or putting a lover in 
her black list, or promoting a lover to her blue list, or adding 
up her lovers, or otherwise posting her book. 

I banish the false wretch from this moment, and I strike 
him out of my Cupidon (my name for my ledger, my dear), 
this very night. But I am resolved to have the account of 
the man from Somewhere.” 

Upon my life,” says Mortimer, languidly, “ I find it im- 
mensely embarrassing to have the eyes of Europe upon me 
to this extent, and my only consolation is that you will all of 
you execrate Lady Tippins in your secret hearts when you 
find, as you inevitably will, the man from Somewhere a bore. 
Sorry to destroy romance by fixing him with a local habita- 
tion, but my man comes from the country where they make 
the Cape Wine. His name is Harmon, and he was only 
son of a tremendous old rascal who made his money by Dust. 


8 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


He grew rich as a Dust Contractor, and hved in a hollow in a 
hilly country entirely composed of Dust. On his own small 
estate the growling old vagabond threw up his own moun- 
tain range, and its geological formation was Dust. Coal- 
dust, vegetable-dust, bone-dust, crockery-dust, rough dust 
and sifted dust, — all manner of Dust. The moral being — I 
believe that’s the right expression — of this exemplary per- 
son, derived its highest gratification from anathematizing his 
nearest relations and turning them out of doors. Having be- 
gun (as was natural) by rendering these attentions to the 
wife of his bosom, he next found himself at leisure to bestow 
a similar recognition on the claims of his daughter. He 
chose a husband for her, entirely to his own satisfaction and 
not in the least to hers, and proceeded to settle upon her, as 
her marriage portion, I don’t know how much Dust, but 
something immense. At this stage of the affair the poor girl 
respectfully intimated that she was secretly engaged to that 
popular character whom the novelists and versifiers call An- 
other, and that such a marriage wmuld make Dust of her 
heart and Dust of her life — in short would set her up, on a 
very extensive scale, in her father’s business. Immediately, 
the venerable parent — on a cold winter’s night, it is said — 
anathematized and turned her out. The pecuniary resources 
of Another were, as they usually are, of a very limited na- 
ture. I believe I am not using too strong an expression 
when I say that Another was hard up. However, he mar- 
ried the young lady, and they lived in a humble dwelling, 
probably possessing a porch ornamented with honeysuckle 
and woodbine twining, until she died. Another was so cut 
up by the loss of his young wife that if he outlived her a year 
it was as much as he did. We must now return, as the nov- 
elists say, and as we all wish they wouldn’t, to the man from 
Somewhere. Being a boy of fourteen, cheaply educating at 
Brussels when his sister’s expulsion befell, it was some little 
time before he heard of it — probably from herself, for the 
mother was dead ; but that I don’t know. Instantly, he ab- 
sconded, and came over here. He must have been a boy of 
spirit and resource, to get here on a stopped allowance of five 
sous a week ; but he did it somehow, and he burst in on his 
father, and pleaded his sister’s cause. Venerable parent 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


9 


promptly resorts to anathematization, and turns him out. 
Shocked and terrified boy takes flight, seeks his fortune, gets 
aboard ship, ultimately turns up on dry land among the Cape 
wine : small proprietor, farmer, grower — whatever you like 
to call it. He was discovered only the other day, after hav- 
ing been expatriated about fourteen years. Venerable par- 
ent dies. His will is found. It is dated very soon after the 
son’s flight. It leaves the lowest of the range of dust-moun- 
tains, with some sort of a dwelling-house at its foot, to an old 
servant who is sole executor, and all the rest of the property 
— which is very considerable — to the son. The son’s inher- 
iting is made conditional on his marrying a girl who at the 
date of the will was a child of four or five years old, and who 
is now a marriageable young woman. Advertisement and 
inquiry discovered the son in the man from Somewhere, and 
at the present moment he is on his way home from there.” 

Mr. Podsnap inquires what would become of the very 
large fortune, in the event of the marriage condition not be- 
ing fulfilled ? Mortimer replies, that by special testamentary 
clause it would then go to the old servant above mentioned, 
passing over and excluding the son ; also, that if the son had 
not been living, the same old servant would have been sole 
residuary legatee. 

Everybody but Mortimer himself becomes aware that the 
Analytical Chemist is, in a ghostly manner, offering him a 
folded paper. 

The chemist advances it under the nose of Mortimer, who 
unfolds the paper. Eeads it, reads it twice, turns it over to 
look at the blank outside, reads it a third time. 

“ This arrives in an extraordinary opportune manner,” 
says Mortimer then, looking with an altered face round the 
table: “this is the conclusion of the story of the identical 
man.” 

“ Already married ? ” one guesses. 

“ Declines to marry ? ” another guesses. 

“ Codicil among the dust ? ” another guesses. 

“ Why, no,” says Mortimer ; “ remarkable thing, you are 
all wrong. The story is completer and rather more exciting 
than I supposed. Man’s drowned I ” 


10 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


CHAPTER III. 

T he messenger who had brought the paper was a boy of 
about fifteen. 

“ Whose writing is this ? ” said Mortimer. 

“Mine, sir.” 

“ Who told you to write it ? ” 

“ My father, Jesse Hexam.” 

“ Is it he who found the body ? ” 

“ Yes, sir.” 

“ What is your father ? ” 

The boy hesitated, then said, folding a plait in the right leg 
of his trousers, “ He gets his living alongshore.” 

“ Is it far to your father’s ? ” 

“ It’s a goodish stretch, sir. I went first to your office, ac- 
cording to the direction of the papers found in the pockets, 
and there I see nobody but a chap of about my age, who sent 
me on here.” 

There was a curious mixture in the boy, of uncompleted 
savagery, and uncompleted civilization. His voice was 
hoarse and coarse, and his face w as coarse, and his stunted 
figure was coarse ; but he was cleaner than other boys of his 
type ; and his writing, though large and round, was good. 

“ Were any means taken, do you know, boy, to ascertain 
if it was possible to restore life ? ” Mortimer inquired, as he 
sought for his hat. 

“ You wouldn’t ask, sir, if you knew his state.” 

The gloomy Eugene had strolled in and made the proposal 
to Mortimer, “ I’ll go with you, if you like ? ” So, they all 
three went away together in the vehicle that had brought 
the boy. 

In and out among vessels that .seemed to have got ashore, 
and houses that seemed to have got afloat — among bowsprits 
staring into windows, and windows staring into ships — the 
wheels rolled on, until they stopped at a dark corner, river- 
washed and otherwise not washed at aU, where the boy 
alighted and opened the door. 

“ You must walk the rest, sir ; it’s not many yards.” He 
spoke in the singular number, to the express exclusion of 
Eugene. “ Here’s my father’s sir ; where the light is.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


11 


The boy lifted the latch of the door, and they passed at 
once into a low circular room, where a man stood before a 
red fire, looking down into it, and a girl sat engaged in nee- 
dle-work. 

‘‘ The gentleman, father.” 

The figure at the red fire turned, raised its ruffled head, and 
looked like a bird of prey. 

“ You’re Mortimer Lightwood, Esquire ; are you sir ? ” 
Mortimer Lightwood is my name. What you found,” 
said Mortimer, glancing rather shrinkingly towards the 
bunk; “isithere? ” 

“ ’Tain’t not to say here, but it’s close by. I do everything 
reg’lar. I’ve giv’ notice of the circumstarnce to the police, 
and the police have took possession of it. ISTo time ain’t been 
lost, on any hand. The police have put it into print already, 
and here’s what the print says of it.” 

Taking up a bottle with a lamp in it, he held it near a paper 
on the wall, with the police heading. Body Found. The two 
friends read the handbill as it stuck against the wall, and Gaf- 
fer read them as he held the light. 

Only papers on the unfortunate man, I see,” said Light- 
wood, glancing from the description of what was found, to 
the finder. 

Only papers.” 

Here the girl arose with her work in her hand, and went 
out at the door. 

‘‘Ho money,” pursued Mortimer ; “ but threepence in one 
of the skirt-pockets.” 

“ Three. Penny. Pieces,” said Gafier Hexam, in as many 
sentences. 

“ The trousers pockets empty, and turned inside out.” 

Gaffer Hexam nodded. “ But that’s common. Whether 
it’s the wash of the tide or no, I can’t say. How, here,” 
moving the light to another similar placard, “ his pockets was 
found empty, and turned inside out. And here,” moving the 
light to another, “ her pocket was found empty, and turned 
inside out. And so was this one’s. And so was that one’s. 
I can’t read, nor I don’t want to, for I know ’em by their 
places on the wall. . This one was a sailor, with two anchors 
and a flag and G. F. T. on his arm. Look and see if he 
warn’t.” 


12 


CONDENSED CLASSICS, 


‘‘ Quite right.” 

“ This one was the young woman in gray boots, and her 
linen marked with a cross. Look and see if she warn’t.” 

“ Quite right.” 

“ This is him as had a nasty cut over the eye. This is them 
two young sisters what tied themselves together with a 
handkercher. This is the drunken old chap, in a pair of list 
slippers and a nightcap, wot had offered — it afterwards come 
out — to make a hole in the water for a quartern of rum stood 
aforehand, and kept to his word for the first and last time in 
his life. They pretty well papers the room, you see ; but I 
know ’em all. I’m scholar enough ! ” 

He waved the light over the whole, as if to typify the light 
of his scholarly intelligence, and then put it down on the ta- 
ble and stood behind it looking intently at his visitors. 

“ Am I to show the way ? ” 

As he opened the door, in pursuance of a nod from Light- 
wood, an extremely pale and disturbed face appeared in the 
doorway — the face of a man much agitated. 

A body missing ? ” asked G-affer Hexam, stopping short; 
“ or a body found ? Which ? ” 

I am lost! ” rephed the man, in a hurried and an eager 
manner. 

“Lost?” 

“ I — I — am a stranger, and don’t know the way. I — I 
tv ant to find the place where I can see what is described here. 
It is possible I may know it.” He was panting, and could 
hardly speak ; but he showed a copy of the newly-printed 
bill that was still wet upon the wall. Perhaps its newness, 
or perhaps the accuracy of his observations of its general 
look, guided G-affer to a ready conclusion. 

“ This gentleman, Mr. Lightwood, is on that business.” 

“ Mr. Lightwood ? ” 

During a pause, Mortimer and the stranger confronted 
each other. Neither knew the other. 

“ I think, sir,” said Mortimer, breaking the awkward si- 
lence with his airy ^elf-possession, “ that you did me the hon- 
or to mention my name ? ” 

“ I repeated it, after this man.” 

“ You said you were a stranger in London ? ” 


Ov R MUTUAL FRIEND. 


13 


“ An utter stranger.” 

“ Are you seeking a Mr. Harmon ? ” 

“Ho.” 

“ Then I believe I can assure you that you are on a fruit- 
less errand and will not find what you fear to find. Will you 
come with us?” 

A little winding through some muddy alleys that might 
have been deposited by the last ill-savored tide, brought 
them to the wicket-gate and bright lamp of a Police Station ; 
where they found the Hight-Inspector. 

“ A bull’s-eye,” said the Hight-Inspector, taking up his 
keys. “How, gentlemen.” 

He opened a cool grot at the end of the yard, and they all 
went in. They quickly came out again, no one speaking but 
Eugene, who remarked to Mortimer, in a whisper, “Hot 
much worse than Lady Tippins.” 

“ It appears to have knocked your friend over — knocked 
him completely off his legs,” Mr. Inspector remarked, in a 
very low voice, and with a searching look (not the first he 
had cast) at the stranger. 

Mr. Lightwood explained that it was no friend of his. 

“Indeed?” said Mr. Inspector, with an attentive ear; 
“ where did you pick him up ? ” 

Mr. Lightwood explained further. 

Mr. Inspector moved nothing but his eyes, as he now add- 
ed, raising his voice : 

“ Turned you faint, air ! Seems you’re not accustomed to 
this kind of work ? ” 

The stranger, who was leaning against the chimneypiece 
with drooping head, looked round and answered, “Ho. It’s 
a horrible sight ! ” 

“ You expected to identify, I am told, sir ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ Have you identified ? ” 

“ Ho. It’s a horrible sight. 0 ! a horrible, horrible sight ! ” 

“ Who did you think it might have been ? ” asked Mr. In- 
spector. “ Grive us a description, sir. Perhaps we can help 
you.” 

“ Ho, no,” said the stranger ; “ It would be quite useless.” 

“ You missed a friend, you know ; or you missed a foe, 


14 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


you know; or you wouldn’t have come here, you know. 
Well, then ; ain’t it reasonable to ask, who was it ? ” Thus 
Mr. Inspector. 

“ You must excuse my telling you. Ko class of man can 
understand better than you, that families may not choose to 
publish their disagreements and misfortunes, except on the 
last necessity. I do not dispute that you discharge your du- 
ty in asking me the question ; you will not dispute my right 
to withhold the answer.” 

“ At least,” said Mr. Inspector, “ you will not object to 
leave me your card, sir ? ” 

‘‘ I should not object, if I had one ; but I have not.” He 
reddened and was much confused as he gave the answer. 

“At least,” said Mr Inspector, with no change of voice or 
manner, “ you will not object to write down your name and 
address? ” 

“Not at all.” 

The stranger stepped up to the desk, and wrote in a rather 
tremulous hand — “Mr. Julius Handford, Exchequer Coffee 
House, Palace Yard, Westminster.” 

“ Staying there, I presume, sir ? ” 

“Staying there.” 

“ Consequently from the country ? ” 

“ Eh ? Yes — ^from the country.” 

“ Good-night, sir.” 

“ Reserve ! ” said Mr Inspector. “ Take care of this piece 
of paper, keep him in view without giving offense, ascertain 
that he is staying there, and find out anything you can about 
him.” 

There being nothing more to be done until -the inquest was 
held next day, the friends went away together, and Gaffer 
Hexam and his son went their separate way. But Gaffer 
bade his boy go home, while he turned into a red-curtained 
tavern, the Six Jolly Fellowship-Porters. 

The boy found his sister again seated before the fire at her 
work, and asked : 

“ Where did you go, Liz ? ” 

“ I went out in the dark.” 

“There was no necessity for that. It was all right 
enough.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


15 


“ One of the gentlemen, the one who didn’t speak, looked 
hard at me. And I was afraid he might know what my face 
meant. But there I Don’t mind me, Charley ! I was all in 
a tremble of another sort when you owned to father you 
could write a little.” 

“ Ah ! But I made believe I wrote so badly as that it was 
odds if any one could read it. And when I wrote slowest, 
and smeared out with my finger most, father was best pleas- 
ed, as he stood looking over me.” 

The girl put aside her work, and drawing her seat close to 
his seat by the fire, laid her arm gently on his shoulder. 

“You’ll make the most of your time, Charley; won’t 
you ? ” 

“Won’t I? Come! I like that. Don’t I?” 

“ Yes, Charley, yes. You work hard at your learning, I 
know. And I work a little, Charley, and plan and contrive a 
little (wake out of my sleep contriving, sometimes) how to 
get together a shilling now, and a shilling then, that shall 
make father believe you are beginning to earn a stray living 
alongshore.” 

At midday following the bird of prey reappeared at the 
Six Jolly Fellowship-Porters, in the character, not new to 
him, of a witness before a coroner’s jury. 

Mr. Mortimer Lightwood, besides sustaining the character 
of one of the witnesses, doubled the part with that of the em- 
inent solicitor who watched the proceedings on behalf of the 
representatives of the deceased, as was duly recorded in the 
newspapers. Mr. Inspector watched the proceedings too, 
and kept his watching closely to himself. 

The jury found. That the body of Mr. John Harmon had 
been discovered floating in the Thames, in an advanced state 
of decay, and much injured ; and that the said Mr. John Har- 
mon had come by his death under highly suspicious circum- 
stances, though by whose act or in what precise manner 
there was no evidence before this jury to show. And they 
appended to their verdict, a recommendation to the Home 
Office to offer a reward for the solution of the mystery. 
Within eight-and-forty hours, a reward of one hundred 
pounds was proclaimed, together with a free pardon to any 
person or persons not the actual perpetrator or perpetrators, 
and so forth in due form. 


16 


COJSDEJSSED CLASSICS. 


CHAPTER IV. 

E EGrINALD WILFER is a name with rather a grand 
sound, suggesting on first acquaintance brasses in coun- 
try churches, scrolls in stained-glass windows, and generally 
the De Wilfers who came over with the Conqueror. For it 
is a remarkable fact in genealogy that no De Any ones ever 
came over with anybody else. 

But the Reginald Wilfer family were of such common- 
place extraction and pursuits that their forefathers had for 
generations modestly subsisted on the Docks, the Excise Of- 
fice, and the Custom House, and the existing R. Wilfer was 
a poor clerk. So poor a clerk, through having a limited salary 
and an unlimited family, that he had never yet attained the 
modest object of his ambition: which was, to wear a com- 
plete new suit of clothes at one time. 

If the conventional Cherub could ever grow up and be 
clothed, he might be photographed as a portrait of Wilfer. 

He was clerk in the drug-house of Chicksey, V eneering, 
and Stobbles. Chicksey and Stobbles, his former masters, 
had both become absorbed in V eneering, once their traveler 
or commission agent. 

R. Wilfer locked up his desk one evening, and, putting his 
bunch of keys in his pocket much as if it were his pegtop, 
made for home. 

Mrs. Wilfer was, of course, a tall woman and an angular. 
Her lord being cherubic, she was necessarily majestic, ac- 
cording to the principle which matrimonially unites con- 
trasts. She was much given to tying up her head in a pock- 
et-handkerchief, knotted under the chin. This headgear, in 
conjunction with a pair of gloves worn within doors, she 
seemed to consider as at once a kind of armor against misfor- 
tune (invariably assuming it when in low spirits or difficul- 
ties), and as a species of full dress. It was therefore with 
some sinking of the spirit that her husband beheld her thus 
heroically attired, putting down her candle in the little hall, 
and coming down the door-steps through the little front 
court to open the gate for him. 

Something had gone wrong with the house-door, for R. 
Wilfer stopp^ on the steps, staring at it, and cried : 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


17 


“Hal— loa!” 

“ Yes,” said Mrs. Wilfer, “ the man came himself with a 
pair of pincers, and took it off, and took it away. He said 
that he had no expectation of ever being paid for it, and as 
he had an order for another Ladies’ School door-plate, it was 
better (burnished up) for the interests of all parties.” 

“ Perhaps it was, my dear ; what do you think ? ” 

“ You are master here, K. W.,” returned his wife. “ It is 
as you think ; not as I do. Perhaps it might have been bet- 
ter if the man had taken the door too.” 

“ My dear, we couldn’t have done without the door.” 

“ Couldn’t we ? ” 

“Why, my dear I Could we?” 

“ It is as you think, R. W. ; not as I do.” With those sub- 
missive words, the dutiful wife preceded him down a few 
stairs to a little basement front room, half kitchen, half par- 
lor, where a girl of about nineteen, with an exceedingly 
pretty figure and face, but with an impatient and petulant 
expression both in her face and in her shoulders, sat playing 
draughts with a younger girl, who was the youngest of the 
House of Wilfer. Hot to encumber this page by telling off 
the Wilfers in detail and casting them up in the gross, it is 
enough that the rest were what is called “ out in the world,” 
in various ways, and that they were Many. 

“ Well Piggy wiggles,” said R. W., “ how de do to-night? 
What I was thinking of, my dear,” to Mrs. WiKer already 
seated in a corner with folded gloves, “ was, that as we have 
let our first floor so well, and as we have now no place in 
'which you could teach pupils, even if pupils — ” 

“ The milkman said he knew of two young ladies of the 
highest respectability who were in search of a suitable estab- 
lishment, and he took a card,” interposed Mrs. Wilfer, with 
severe monotony. “ Tell your father whether it was last 
Monday, Bella.” 

“ But we never heard any more of it, ma,” said Bella, the 
elder girl. 

“ In addition to which, my dear,” her husband urged, “ if 
you have no place to put two young persons into — ” 

“ Pardon me,” Mrs. Wilfer again interposed ; “ they were 
not young persons. Two young ladies of the highest ]'e- 
2 


18 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


spectability. Tell your father, Bella, whether the milkman 
said so.” 

My dear, it is the same thing.” 

‘‘ No it is not,” said Mrs. Wilfer. Pardon me I ” 

I mean, my dear, it is the same thing as to space. As to 
space. If you have no space in which to put two youthful 
fellow-creatures, however eminently respectable, which I 
do not doubt, where are those youthful fellow-creatures to 
be accommodated ? I carry it no further than that.” 

“ I have nothing more to say,” returned Mrs. Wilfer. “ It 
is as you think, R. W. ; not as I do.” 

Here the huffing of Miss Bella and the loss of three of her 
men at a swoop, aggravated by the coronation of an oppo- 
nent, led to that young lady’s jerking the draught-board and 
pieces off the table: which her sister went down on her 
knees to pick up. 

Poor Bella \ ” said Mrs. Wilfer. 

‘‘ And poor Lavinia, perhaps, my dear ? ” suggested R. W. 

^‘Pardon me,” said Mrs. Wilt'er, ‘‘no! Lavinia has not 
known the trial that Bella has known. The trial that your 
daughter Bella has undergone, is, perhaps, without a parallel, 
and has been borne, I will say, nobly. When you see your 
daughter Bella in her black dress, which she alone of all the 
family wears, and when you remember the circumstances 
which have led to her wearing it, and when you know how 
those circumstances have been sustained, then, R. W., lay 
your head upon your pillow and say, ‘ poor Lavinia 1 ’ ” 

Bella, who was now seated on the rug to warm herseff, 
with her brown eyes on the fire and a handful of her brown 
curls in her mouth, laughed at this, and then pouted and half 
cried. 

“ I am sure,” said she, “ though you have no feeling for 
me, pa, I am one of the most unfortunate girls that ever 
lived. You know how poor we are,” (it is probable he did, 
having some reason to know it!) “and what a glimpse of 
wealth I had, and how it melted away, and how I am here in 
this ridiculous mourning — which I hate ! — a kind of a wid- 
ow who never was married. And yet you don’t feel for me. 
— Yes you do, yes you do.” 

This abrupt change was occasioned by her father’s face. 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


19 


She stopped to pull him down from his chair in an attitude 
highly favorable to strangulation, and to give him a kiss and 
a pat or two on the cheek. 

But you ought to feel for me, you know, pa.” 

“ My dear, I do.” 

Yes, I say you ought to. If they had only left me alone 
and told me nothing about it, it would have mattered much 
less. But that nasty Mr. Lightfoot feels it his duty, as he 
says, to write and tell me what is in reserve for me, and then 
I am obliged to get rid of G-eorge Sampson.” 

Here Lavinia, rising to the surface with the last draught- 
man rescued, interposed, ‘‘You never cared for George 
Sampson, Bella.” 

“ And did I say I did, miss ? ” Then pouting again, with 
the curls in her mouth : “ George Sampson was very fond of 
me, and admired me very much, and put up with everything 
I did to him.” 

“You were rude enough to him,” Lavinia again inter- 
posed. 

“ And did I say I wasn’t, miss ? I am not setting up to be 
sentimental about George Sampson. I only say George 
Sampson was better than nothing.” 

Then, whimpering again, and at intervals biting the curls, 
and stopping to look how much was bitten off, “ It’s a shame ! 
There never was such a hard case ! I shouldn’ t care so much 
if it wasn’t so ridiculous. It was ridiculous enough to have 
a stranger coming over to marry me, whether he liked it or 
not. It was ridiculous enough to know what an embarrass- 
ing meeting it would be, and how we never could pretend to 
have an inclination of our own, either of us. It was ridicu- 
lous enough to know I shouldn’t like him — how could I like 
him, left to him in a will, like a dozen of spoons, with every- 
thing cut and dried beforehand, like orange chips. Talk of 
orange flowers indeed ! I declare again it’s a shame ! Those 
ridiculous points would have been smoothed away by the 
money, for I love mone}^, and want money — want it dread- 
fully. I hate to be poor, and we are degradingly poor, of- 
fensively poor, miserably poor, beastly poor. But here I am, 
left with all the ridiculous parts of the situation remaining, 
and, added to them all, this ridiculous dress ! ” 


20 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


The young lady’s lamentations were checked at this point 
by a knuckle, knocking at the half-open door of the room. 
The knuckle had knocked two or three times already, but 
had not been heard. 

“ Who is it ? ” said Mrs. Wilfer, in her Act-of-Parliamenf 
manner. “Enter!” 

A gentleman coming in, Miss Bella, with a short and sharp 
exclamation, scrambled off the hearth-rug and massed the 
bitten curls together in their right place on her neck. 

“ The servant girl had her key in the door as I came up, 
and directed me to this room, telling me I was expected. I 
am afraid I should have asked her to announce me.” 

“ Pardon me,” returned Mrs. Wilfer. “ Kot at all. Two 
of my daughters. P. W., this is the gentleman who has tak- 
en your first floor. He was so good as to make an appoint- 
ment for to-night, when you would be at home.” 

A dark gentleman. Thirty at the utmost. An express- 
ive, one might say handsome, face. A very bad manner. 
In the last degree constrained, reserved, diffident, troubled. 
His eyes were on Miss Bella for an instant, and then looked 
at the ground as he addressed the master of the house. 

“ Seeing that I am quite satisfied, Mr. WiKer, with the 
rooms, and with their situation, and with their price, I sup- 
pose a memorandum between us of two or three lines, and a 
payment down, will bind the bargain ? I wish to send in 
furniture without delay.” 

“ Shall I mention, sir,” insinuated the landlord, expecting 
it to be received as a matter of course, “ the form of a refer- 
ence ? ” 

“ I think,” returned the gentleman, after a pause, “ that a 
reference is not necessary ; neither, to say the truth, is it con- 
venient, for I am a stranger in London. I require no refer- 
ence from you, and perhaps, therefore, you will require none 
from me. That will be fair on both sides. Indeed, I show 
the greater confidence of the two, for I will pay in advance 
whatever you please, and I am going to trust my furnitm-e 
here.” 

“Well!” observed E. Wilfer, cheerfully, “money and 
goods are certainly the best of references.” 

“ Do you think they are the best, pa ? ” asked Miss Bella, 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


21 


in alow voice, and without looking over the shoulder as she 
warmed her foot on the fender. 

Among the best, my dear.” 

“ I should have thought, myself, it was so easy to add the 
usual kind of one,” said Bella, with a toss of her curls. 

The gentleman listened to her, with a face of marked at- 
tention, though he neither looked up nor changed his atti- 
tude. 

When the agreement was ready in duplicate it was signed 
by the contracting parties, R. WiKer, and J ohn Rokesmith, 
Esquire. 

When it came to Bella’s turn to sign her name as witness, 
Mr. Rokesmith, who was standing, as he had sat, with a hes- 
itating hand upon the table, looked at her stealthily, but nar- 
rowly. He looked at the pretty figure bending down over 
the paper and saying, “ Where am I to go, pa ? Here, in 
this corner ? ” He looked at the beautiful brown hair, shad- 
ing the coquettish face ; he looked at the free dash of the sig- 
nature, which was a bold one for a woman’s ; and then they 
looked at one another. 

“ Much obliged to you. Miss WiKer.” 

Obliged?” 

“ I have given you so much trouble.” 

“Signing my name? Yes, certainly. But I am your 
landlord’s daughter, sir.” 

As there was nothing more to do but pay eight sovereigns 
in earnest of the bargain, pocket the agreement, appoint a 
time for the arrival of his furniture and himself, and go, Mr. 
Rokesmith did that as awkwardly as it might be done, and 
was escorted by his landlord to the outer air. When R. 
WiKer returned, candlestick in hand, to the bosom of his 
family, he found the bosom agitated. 

“ Pa,” said Bella, “ we have got a Murderer for a tenant.” 

“ Pa,” said Lavinia, “ we have got a Robber.” 

“ To see him for his life unable to look anybody in the 
face I ” said Bella, “ There never was such an exhibition.” 

“My dears,” said their father, “he is a diffident gentle- 
man, and I should say particularly so in the society of girls of 
your age.” 

“ Honsense, our age ! ” cried Bella,, impatiently. ‘^What’s 
that got to- do with him ? ” 


22 


CONDENSED CLASSICS, 


“ Besides, we are not of the same age : — which age ? ” de- 
manded Lavinia. 

Never you mind, Lavvy,” retorted Bella ; you wait till 
you are of an age to ask such questions. Pa, mark my 
words ! Between Mr. Rokesmith and me there is a natural 
antipathy and a deep distrust ; and something will come of 


it!’ 


‘^My dear, and girls,” said the cherub-patriarch, “be- 
tween Mr. Rokesmith and me there is a matter of eight sov- 
ereigns, and something for supper shall come of it, if you’ll 
agree upon the article.” 

“ Pa,” said Bella, “ when old Mr. Harmon made such a fool 
of me (not to mention himself, as he is dead), what do you 
suppose he did it for ? ” 

“ Impossible to say, my dear. As I .have told you times 
out of number since his will was brought to light, I doubt if I 
ever exchanged a hundred words with the old gentleman. 
If it was his whim to surprise us, his whim succeeded. Por 
he certainly did it.” 

On going to bed, Bella continued her moan : Nothing to go 
out in, nothing to dress by, only a nasty box to dress at in- 
stead of a commodious dressing-table, and being obliged to 
take in suspicious lodgers. On the last grievance as her cli- 
max, she laid great stress — and might have laid greater, had 
she known that if Mr. Julius Handford had a twin brother 
upon earth, Mr. John Rokesmith was the man. 


CHAPTER Y. 


YER against a London house, a corner house not far 



from Cavendish Square, a man with a wooden leg had 
sat for some years, with his remaining foot in a basket in 
cold w'eather, picking up a living in this wise: — Every 
morning at eight o’clock, he stumped to the corner, carrying 
a chair, a clothes-horse, a pair of trestles, a board, a basket, 
and an umbrella, all strapped together. Separating these, 
the board and trestles became a counter, the basket supplied 
the few small lots of fruit and sweets that he offered for sale 
upon it, and became a foot warmer, the unfolded clothes- 
horse displayed a choice collection of halfpenny ballads and 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


23 


became a screen, and the stool planted within it became his 
post for the rest of the day. All weathers saw the man at 
the post. This is to be accepted in a double sense, for he 
contrived a back to his wooden stool, by placing it against 
the lamp-post. When the weather was wet, he put up his 
umbrella over his stock in trade, not over himself ; when the 
weather was dry, he furled that faded article, tied it round 
with a piece of yarn, and laid it cross- wise under the trestles ; 
where it looked like an un wholesomely-forced lettuce that 
had lost in color and crispness what it had gained in size. 

On the front of his sale-board hung a little placard, like a 
kettle-holder, bearing the inscription in his own small text : 


Errands gone 
On With fi 
Delity By 

Ladies and Gentlemen 
I remain 

Your humble Servt : 
Silas Wegg. 


He had not only settled it with himself in course of time 
that he was errand-goer by appointment to the house at the 
corner (though he received such commissions not half a doz- 
en times in a year, and then only as some servant’s deputy), 
but also that he was one of the house’s retainers, and owed 
vassalage to it, and was bound to leal and loyal interest in it. 
For this reason, he always spoke of it as “ Our House,” and, 
though his knowledge of its affairs was mostly speculative 
and all wrong, claimed to be in its confidence. On similar 
grounds he never beheld an inmate at any one of its win- 
dows but he touched his hat. Yet, he knew so little about 
the inmates, that he gave them names of his own invention : 
as “ Miss Elizabeth,” “ Master G-eorge,” “ Aunt Jane,” “ Un- 
cle Parker ” — having no authority whatever for any such 
designations, but particularly the last — to which, as a natural 
consequence, he stuck with great obstinacy. 


24 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


The only article in which Silas dealt that was not hard, 
was gingerbread. On a certain day, some wretched infant 
having purchased the damp gingerbread-horse (fearfully out 
of condition), and the adhesive bird-cage, which had been 
exposed for the day’s sale, he had taken a tin box from under 
his stool to produce a relay of those dreadful specimens, and 
was going to look in at the lid, when he said to himseK, paus- 
ing : “ Oh ! Here you are again ! ” 

The words referred to a broad, round-shouldered, one- 
sided old fellow in mourning, comically ambling towards the 
corner, dressed in a pea overcoat, and carrying a large stick. 
He wore thick shoes, and thick leather gaiters, and thick 
gloves like a hedger’s. Both as to his dress and to himself, 
he was of an overlapping rhinoceros build, with folds in his 
cheeks, and his forehead, and his eyelids, and his lips, and his 
ears ; but with bright, eager, childishly-inquiring, gray eyes, 
under his ragged eyebrows and broad-brimmed hat. A 
very odd-looking old fellow altogether. 

‘‘Here you are again,” repeated Mr. Wegg, musing. 

And what are you now ? Are you in the Funds, or where 
are you ? Have you lately come to settle in this neighbor- 
hood, or do you own to another neighborhood ? Are you in 
independent circumstances, or is it wasting the motions of a 
bow on you? Come! I’ll speculate ! I’ll invest a bow in 
you.” 

The salute was acknowledged with : 

Morning, sir 1 Morning ! Morning I ” 

(“ Calls- me Sir i ” said Mr. W egg, to himself. won’t 
answer. A bow gone I ”) 

“ Morning,, morning, morning I ” 

“Appears to be rather a ’arty old cock too,” said Mr. 
W egg, as before. “ Grood-morning to you^ sir.” 

“ Do you remember me, then ? ” 

“ I have noticed you go past our house, sir, several times 
in the course of the last week or so.” 

“ Our house,” repeated the other. “ Meaning — ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Mr. Wegg. 

“ Oh 1 How, what,” pursued the old fellow, in an inquisi- 
tive manner, “ what do they allow you now ? ” 

“It’s job work that I do for our house,” returned Silas, 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


25 


dryly, and with reticence ; “ it’s not yet brought to an exact 
allowance.” 

‘‘Oh! It’ snot yet brought to an exact allowance? No! 
It’s not yet brought to an exact allowance. Oh 1 — Morn- 
ing, morning, morning ! ” 

“ Appears to be rather a cracked old cock,” thought Silas 
qualifying his former good opinion, as the other ambled off 
But in a moment he was back again with the question : 

“ How did you get your wooden leg ? ” 

Mr. Wegg replied, tartly, “ In an accident.” 

“ Do you like it? ” 

“ Well 1 I haven’t got to keep it warm,” Mr. Wegg made 
answer. 

“ He hasn’t,” repeated the other to his knotted stick, as he 
gave it a hug ; “ he hasn’t got — ha ! — ha I — to keep it warm I 
Did you ever hear of the name of Boffin ? ” 

“ No,” said Mr. Wegg, “ I never did hear of the name of 
Boffin.” 

“ Do you like it? ” 

“ Why, no,” retorted Mr. Wegg, “ I can’t say I do.” 

“ Why don’t you like it ? ” 

“I don’t know why I don’t,” retorted Mr. Wegg, ap- 
proaching frenzy, “ but I don’t at all.” 

“ Now, I’ll tell you something that’ll make you sorry for 
that,” said the stranger, smiling. “ My name’s Boffin.” 

“ I can’t help it I ” returned Mr. W egg. 

“But there’s another chance for you,” said Mr. Boffin, 
smiling still, “ Do you like the name of Nicodemus ? Think 
it over. N ick, or N oddy . ’ ’ 

“ It is not, sir,” Mr. Wegg rejoined, “ it is not a name as I 
could wish any one that I had a respect for to call me by.” 

“ Noddy Boffin,” said that gentleman. “ Noddy. That’s 
my name. Noddy — or Nick — Boffin. What’s your 
name? ” 

“ Silas Wegg. I don’t know why Silas, and I don’t know 
why Wegg.” 

“Now, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin, hugging his stick closer, 
“ I want to make a sort of offer to you. Do you remember 
when you first see me ? ” 

The wooden Wegg looked at him with a meditative eye. 


26 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


and also with a softened air as descrying possibility of profit. 
“Let me think. I ain’t quite sure, and yet I generally take 
a powerful sight of notice, too. W as it on a Monday morn- 
ing, when the butcher-boy had been to our house for orders, 
and bought a ballad of me, which, being unacquainted with 
the tune, I run it over to him ? ” 

“ Right, W egg, right I But he bought more than one.” 

“Yes, to be sure, sir ; he bought several ; and wishing to 
lay out his money to the best, he took my opinion to guide 
his choice, and we went over the collection together. To be 
sure we did.” 

“ What do you think I was doing, W egg ? I was a listen- 
ing. JSTot in a dishonorable way, Wegg, because you was 
singing to the butcher ; and you wouldn’t sing secrets to a 
butcher in the street, you know.” 

“ It never happened that I did so yet, to the best of my re- 
membrance,’^ said Mr. Wegg, cautiously. 

“ You haven’t got another stool, have you ? I’m rather 
thick in my breath.” 

“ I haven’t got another, but you’re welcome to this,” said 
W egg, resigning it. “ It’s a treat to me to stand.” 

“ Well,” repeated Boffin, “ I was a listening to you with 
hadmiration amounting to haw. I thought to myself, 

‘ Here’s a man with a wooden leg — a literary man with — 5’ ” 

“ N — not exactly so, sir,” said Mr. Wegg. 

“ Why, you know every one of these songs by name and 
by tune, and if you want to read or to sing any one on ’em off 
straight, you’ve only to whip on your spectacles and do it I” 
cried Mr. Boffin. “ I see you at it ! ” 

“Well, sir,” returned Mr. Wegg, with a conscious inclina- 
tion of the head ; “ we’ll say literary, then.” 

“ ‘ A literary man — with a wooden leg — and all Print is 
open to him ! ’ And it is, ain’t it ? ” 

“ Why, truly, sir,” Mr. Wegg admitted, with modesty ; “ I 
believe you couldn’t show me the piece of English print that 
I wouldn’t be equal to collaring and throwing.” 

“ On the spot ? ” said Mr. Boffin. 

“ On the spot.” 

“I know’d it! Tlien consider this. Here am I, a man 
without a w'ooden leg, and yet all print is shut to me.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


27 


“ Indeed, sir ? ” Mr. Wegg returned with increasing self- 
complacency. “ Education neglected ? 

“ Neg-lected ! ” repeated Boffin, with emphasis. “ That 
ain’t no word for it. I don’t mean to say but what if you 
showed me a B, I could so far give you change for it, as to 
answer Boffin. N ow, look here. I’m retired from business. 
Me and Mrs. Boffin — Henerietty Boffin — which her father’s 
name was Henery, and her mother’s name was Hetty, and 
so you get it — we live on a compittance, under the will of a 
diseased governor.” 

“ Gentleman dead, sir ? ” 

“Man alive, don’t I tell you? A diseased governor? 
Now, it’s too late for me to begin shoveling and sifting at 
alphabeds and grammar-books. But I want some reading 
— some fine bold reading, some splendid book in a gorging 
Lord-Mayor’s-Show of wollumes, as’ll reach right down 
your pint of view, and take time to go by you. How can I 
get that reading, Wegg ? By paying a man truly qualified 
to do it, so much an hour (say twopence) to come and do it.” 

“ Hem ! Flattered, sir, I am sure,” said Wegg, beginning 
to regard himseK quite in a new light. “Hem! This is the 
offer you mentioned, sir ? ” 

“Yes. Ho you like it?” 

“ I am considering of it, Mr Boffin.” 

“ I don’t,” said Boffin, in a free-handed manner, “ want to 
tie a literary man — with a wooden leg — down too tight. A 
halfpenny an hour shan’t part us. The hours are your own 
to choose, after you’ve done for the day with your house 
here. I live over Maiden-Lane way — out Holloway direc- 
tion — and you’ve only got to go East-and-by-North when 
you’ve finished here, and you’re there. Twopence half- 
penny an hour,” said Boffin, taking a piece of chalk from his 
pocket and getting off the stool to work the sum on the top 
of it in his own way ; “ two long’uns and a short’un — two- 
pence halfpenny; two short’uns is a long’un and two two 
long’uns is four long’uns — making five long’uns ; six nights 
a week at five long’uns a night,” scoring them all down sepa- 
rately, “and you mount up to thirty long’uns. A round’un 1 
Half a crown ! ” 

“ Half a crown,” said Wegg, meditating. “ Yes. (It ain’t 
much,- sir.) Half-a-crown.” 


28 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Per week, you know.” 

“ Per week. Y es. As to the amount of strain upon the 
intellect now. Was you thinking at all of Poetry?” Mr. 
Wegg inquhed, musing. 

Would it come dearer ? ” Mr. Boffin asked. 

“It would come dearer,” Mr. Wegg returned. “For 
when a person comes to grind off poetry night after night, it 
is but right he should expect to be paid for its weakening ef- 
fect on his mind.” 

“To tell you the truth, Wegg,” said Boffin, “I wasn't 
thinking of poetry, except in so far as this : — If you was to 
happen now and then to feel yourself in the mind to tip me 
and Mrs. Boffin one of your ballads, why then we should 
drop into poetry.” 

“ I follow you, sir,” said Wegg. “ But not being a regular 
musical professional, I should be loath to engage myself for 
that; and therefore when I dropped into poetry, I should ask 
to be considered, so fur, in the light of a friend.” 

At this, Mr. Boffin’s eyes sparkled, and he shook Silas 
earnestly by the hand. 

“ What do you think of the terms, Wegg ? ” 

“ Mr. Boffin, I never bargain.” 

“ So I should have thought of you ! ” said Mr. Boffin, ad- 
miringly. 

“ No, sir. I never did ’aggie and I never will ’aggie. Con- 
sequently I meet you at once, free and fair, with — Done, for 
double the money ! ” 

Mr. Boffin seemed a little unprepared for this conclusion, 
but assented, with the remark, “ You know better what it 
ought to be than I do, Wegg,” and again shook hands with 
him upon it. 

“ Could you begin to-night, Wegg ? ” he then demanded. 

“Yes, sir,” said Mr. Wegg, careful to leave all the eager- 
ness to him. “ I see no difficulty if you wish it. You are 
provided with the needful implement — a book, sir ? ” 

“Bought him at a sale,” said Mr. Boffin. “Eight wol- 
lumes. Bed and gold. Purple ribbon in every wollume, to 
keep the place where you leave off. Do you know him ? ” 

“ The book’s name, sir ? ” inquired Silas. 

“ I thought you might have know’d liim without it,” said 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


29 


Mr. Boffin, slightly disappointed. ‘‘ His name is Decline- 
And-Fall-Off-Ttie-Rooshan-Empire.” 

“ Ay, indeed ! I haven’t been not to say right slap through 
him, very lately,” Mr. Wegg made answer, “having been 
otherways employed, Mr. Boffin. But know him ? Old fa- 
miliar dechning and falling off the Rooshan ? Rather, sir ! 
Ever since I was not so high as your stick. Ever since my 
eldest brother left our cottage to enlist into the army. On 
which occasion, as the ballad that was made about it de- 
scribes : 

“ Beside that cottage door, Mr. Boffin, 

A girl was on her knees ; 

She held aloft a snowy scarf, Sir, 

Which (my eldest brother noticed) fluttered in the breeze. 

She breathed a prayer fo? him, Mr. Boffin ; 

A prayer he could not hear. 

And my eldest brother lean’d upon his sword, Mr. Boffin, 

And wiped away a tear.” 

Much impressed by this family circumstance, and also by 
the friendly disposition of Mr. Wegg, as exemplified in his so 
soon dropping into poetry, Mr. Boffin again shook hands 
with that ligneous sharper, and besought him to name his 
hour. Mr. Wegg named eight. 

“Where I live,” said Mr. Boffin, “is called The Bower. 
Boffin’s Bower is the name Mrs. Boffin christened it when 
we come into it as a property. If you should meet with 
anybody that don’t know it by that name (which hardly 
anybody does), when you’ve got nigh upon about a odd 
mile, or say and a quarter if you like, up Maiden Lane, Bat- 
tle Bridge, ask for Harmony Jail, and you’ll be put right. 
My fist again, Wegg. Morning, morning, morning ! ” 

When night came, her veiled eyes beheld stumping to- 
wards Boffin’s Bower Mr. Wegg. 

Pushing the gate, which stood ajar, Wegg looked into an 
enclosed space where certain tall dark mounds rose high 
against the sky, and where the pathway to the Bower was 
indicated between two lines of broken crockery set in ashes. 
A white figure advancing along this path, proved to be noth- 
ing more ghostly than Mr. Boffin, easily attired for the pur- 
suit of knowledge, in an undress garment of short white 


30 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


smock-frock. He conducted his literary friend to the inte- 
rior of the Bower, and there presented him to Mrs. Boffin, a 
stout lady of a rubicund and cheerful aspect, in a low even- 
ing-dress of sable satin, and a large black velvet hat and 
feathers. 

“ Mrs. Boffin, Wegg,” said Boffin, “ is ahighfl3^er at Fash- 
ion. And her make is such, that she does it credit. As to 
myself, I ain’t yet as Fash’nable as I may come to be. Hen- 
erietty, old lady, this is the gentleman that’s a going to de- 
chne and fall off the Rooshan Empire.” 

“ And I am sure I hope it’ll do you both good,” said Mrs. 
Boffin. 

There were two wooden settles by the fire, one on either 
side of it, with a corresponding tattle before each. On one 
of these tables the eight volumes were ranged flat, in a row, 
like a galvanic battery ; on the other, certain squat case- bot- 
tles of inviting appearance seemed to stand on tiptoe to ex- 
change glances with Mr. Wegg over a front row of tumblers 
and a basin of white sugar. On the hob, a kettle steamed ; 
on the hearth, a cat reposed. Facing the fire between the 
settles, a sofa, a footstool, and a little table, formed a centre- 
piece devoted to Mrs. Boffin. They were garish in taste and 
color, but were expensive articles of drawing-room furni- 
ture, that had a very odd look beside the settles and the flar- 
ing gaslight pendent from the ceiling. There was a flowery 
carpet on the floor ; but, instead of reaching to the fireside, 
its glowing vegetation stopped short at Mrs. Boffin’s foot- 
stool, and gave place to a region of sand and sawdust. Mr. 
Wegg also noticed, with admiring eyes, that, while the 
flowery land displayed such hollow ornamentation as stuffed 
birds and waxen fruits under glass-shades, there were, in 
the territory where vegetation ceased, compensatory 
shelves on which the best part of a large pie and likewise of 
a cold joint were plainly discernible among other solids. The 
room itself was large, though low ; and the heavy frames of 
its old-fashioned windows, and the heavy beams in its 
crooked ceiling, seemed to indicate that it had once been a 
house of some mark standing alone in the country. 

“ Do you like it, Wegg ? ” asked Mr. Boffin, in his pounc- 
ing manner. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


31 


“ I admire it greatly, sir,” said Wegg. “ Peculiar comfort 
at this fireside, sir.” 

“ Do you understand it, Wegg ? ” 

“ Why, in a general way, sir,” Mr. Wegg was beginning 
slowly and knowingly, w'ith his head stuck on one side, as 
evasive people do begin, when the other cut him short ; 

^^You don't understand it, Wegg, and I’ll explain it. 
These arrangments is made by mutual consent between Mrs. 
Boffin and me. Mrs. Boffin, as Vve mentioned, is a highflyer 
at F ashion ; at present I’m not. I don’t go higher than com- 
fort, and comfort of the sort that I’m equal to the enjyment 
of. Well then. Where would be the good of Mrs. Boffin 
and me quarreling over it? We never did quarrel, before 
we come into Boffin’s Bower as a property : why quarrel 
when we have come into Boffin’s Bower as a property ? So 
Mrs. Boffin, she keeps up her part of the room, in her way ; 
I keep up my part of the room in mine. In consequence of 
which we have at once, Sociability (I should go melancholy 
mad without Mrs. Boffin), Fashion, and Comfort. If I get 
by degrees to be a highflyer at Fashion, then Mrs. Boffin 
will by degrees come for’arder. If Mrs. Boffin should ever 
be less of a dab at Fashion than she is at the present time, 
then Mrs. Boffin’s carpet would go back’arder. If we 
should both continny as we are, why then here we are, and 
give us a kiss, old lady. Kow, what’ll you read on ? ” 

“ Thank you, sir,” returned Wegg, as if there were noth- 
ing new in his reading at all. I generally do it on gin and 
water.” 

Mrs. Boffin’s Fashion, as a less inexorable deity than the 
idol usually worshiped under that name, did not forbid her 
mixing for her literary guest, or asking; if he found the result 
to his liking. Mr. Boffin began to compose himself as a 
listener, with exultant eyes. 

Sorry to deprive you of a pipe, Wegg,” he said, filling 
his own, “ but you can’t do both together. Oh ! and another 
thing I forgot to name ! When you come in here of an 
evening, and look round you, and notice anything on a shelf 
that happens to catch your fancy,* mention it.” 

Wegg, who had been going to put on his spectacles, im- 
mediately laid them down, with the sprightlj^ observation : 


32 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“You read my thoughts, sir. Do my eyes deceive me, or 
is that object up there a — a pie ? It can’t be a pie.” 

“ Yes, it’s a pie, Wegg,” replied Mr. Boffin, 'with a glance 
of some little discomfiture at the Decline and Fall, 

The pie was brought down, and the worthy Mr. Boffin ex- 
ercised his patience until Wegg had finished the dish, pushed 
away his plate, and put on his spectacles. Mr. Boffin lighted 
his pipe and looked with beaming eyes into the opening 
world before him, and Mrs.. Boffin reclined in a fashionable 
manner on her sofa : as one who would be part of the audi- 
ence if she found she could, and would go to sleep if she 
found she couldn’t. 

“ Hem ! ” began Wegg, “ This, Mr. Boffin and Lady, is the 
first chapter of the first wollume of the Decline and Fall off 
— ” here he looked hard at the book, and stopped. 

“ What’s the matter, Wegg ? ” 

“Why, it comes into my mind, do you know, sir,” said 
Wegg, with an air of insinuating frankness, “ that you made 
a little mistake this morning, which I had meant to set you 
right in, only something put it out of my head. I think you 
said Eooshan Empire, sir ? ” 

“ It is Booshan ; ain’t it, Wegg ? ” 

“Ho, sir. Koman. Roman.” 

“ What’s the difference, Wegg ? ” 

“ The difference, sir ? ” Mr. Wegg was faltering and in 
danger of breaking down, when a bright thought flashed 
upon him. “ The difference, sir ? There you place me in 
a difficulty, Mr. Boffin. Suffice it to observe, that the differ- 
ence is best postponed to some other occasion when Mrs. 
Boffin does not honor us with her company. In Mrs. Bof- 
fin’s presence, sir, we had better drop it.” 

Then Mr. Wegg entered on his task ; going straight across 
country at everything that came before him ; taking all the 
hard words, biographical and geographical ; getting rather 
shaken by Hadrian, Trajan, and the Antonines ; stumbling 
at Polybius (pronounced Polly Beeious, and supposed by 
Mr. Boffin to be a Roman virgin, and by Mrs. Boffin to be re- 
sponsible for that necessity of dropping it) ; heavily un- 
seated by Titus Antoninus Pius; up again and galloping 
smoothly with Augustus ; finally getting over the ground 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


33 


well with Commodus ; who, under the appellation of Com- 
modious, was held by Mpk Boffin to have been quite un- 
worthy of his English origin, and not to have acted up to 
his name ” in his government of the Koman people. With 
the death of this personage, Mr. Wegg terminated his first 
reading, long before which consummation several total 
eclipses of Mrs. Boffin’s candle behind her black velvet disc 
would have been very alarming, but for being regularly ac- 
companied by a potent smell of burnt pens when her feath- 
ers took fire, which acted as a restorative and woke her. 
Mr. Wegg, having read on by rote and attached as few 
ideas as possible to the text, came out of the encounter 
fresh ; but Mr. Boffin, who had soon laid down his unfin- 
ished pipe, and had ever since sat intently staring with his 
eyes and mind at the confounding enormities of the Eo- 
mans, was so severely punished that he could hardly wish 
his literary friend Good-night, and articulate “ To-morrow.” 

“ Commodious,” gasped Mr. Boffin, staring at the moon, 
after letting W egg out at the gate and fastening it : “ Com- 
modious fights in that wild-beast show, seven hundred and 
thirty-five times, in one character only ! As if that wasn’t 
stunning enough, a hundred lions is turned into the same 
wild-beast show all at once ! As if that wasn’t stunning 
enough. Commodious, in another character, kills ’em all off 
in a hundred goes ! As if that wasn’t stunning enough, 
Yittle-us, (and well named too) eats six millions’ worth, 
English money, in seven months ! Wegg takes it easy, but 
upon my soul, to a old bird like myself these are scarers. 
And even now that Commodious is strangled, I don’t see a 
way to our bettering ourselves.” Mr. Boffin added as he 
turned his pensive steps towards the Bower and shook his 
head, “ I didn’t think this morning there was half so many 
Scarers in Print. But I’m in for it now ! ” 

CHAPTER YI. 

T he Six Jolly Fellowship-Porters, already mentioned 
as a tavern of a dropsical appearance, had long settled 
down into a state of hale infirmity. 

Miss Potterson, sole proprietor and manager of the Fel- 

3 


34 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


lowship-Porters, reigned supreme on her throne, the Bar, 
and a man must have drunk himself mad drunk indeed if he 
thought he could contest a point with her. 

“ Now, you mind, you Riderhood,” said Miss Abbey Pot- 
terson, with emphatic forefinger over the half-door, “ the 
Fellowships don’t want you at all, and would rather by far 
have your room than your company.” 

“You’re cruel hard upon me, Miss Potterson.” 

Miss Potterson read her newspaper with contracted 
brows, and took no notice until he whispered : 

“Miss Potterson! Ma’am! Might I have half a word 
with you ? ” 

“ Well? ” said Miss Potterson, with a manner as short as 
she herself was long, “ say your half word. Bring it out.” 

“ Miss Potterson ! Ma’am ! W ould you ’sxcuse me tak- 
ing the liberty of asking, is it my character that you take ob- 
jections to ? ” 

“ Certainly, ’ said Miss Potterson. 

“ Might you have any apprehensions — ^leastway beliefs or 
suppositions — that the company’s property mightn’t be al- 
together to be considered safe, if I used the house too regu- 
lar?” 

“ What do you want to know for ? ” 

“Well, Miss Abbey, respectfully meaning no offense to 
you, it would be some satisfaction to a man’s mind, to under- 
stand why the Fellowship-Porters is not to be free to such as 
me, and is to be free to such as G-afFer.” 

The face of the hostess darkened with some shadow of 
perplexity, as she replied : “ G-affer has never been where 
you have been.” 

“ Signifying in Quod, Miss ? Perhaps not. But he may 
have merited it. He may be suspected of far worse than 
ever I was.” 

“ Who suspects him ? ” 

“ Many, perhaps. One, beyond all doubts. I do.” 

“ Fow are not much.” 

“ But I was his pardner. I am the man that was his pard- 
ner, and I am the man that suspects him.” 

“ Then,” suggested Miss Abbey, though with a deeper 
shade of perplexity than before, “ you criminate yourself.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


35 


No, I don’t, Miss Abbey. For how does it stand ? It 
stands this way. When I was his pardner, I couldn’t never 
give him satisfaction. Why couldn’t I never give him satis- 
faction ? Because my luck was bad ; because I couldn’t find 
many enough of ’em. How was his luck ? Always good. 
Notice this ! Always good ! Ah ! There’s a many games, 
Miss Abbey, in which there’s chance, but there’s a many oth- 
ers in which there’s skill too, mixed along with it.” 

“ That GrafFer has a skill in finding what he finds, who 
doubts, man ? ” asked Miss Abbey. 

“ A skill in purwiding what he finds, perhaps,” said Eider- 
hood, shaking his evil head. 

I say so. Miss Abbey ! And mind you ! I’ll follow him 
up. Miss Abbey I And mind you ! I’ll bring him to book at 
last, if it’s twenty year hence, I will ! Who’s he, to be fa- 
vored along of his daughter ? Ain’t I got a daughter of my 
own ? ” 

With that flourish, Mr. Eiderhood swaggered off to the 
tap-room. 

“You Bob Glibbery,” said Miss Abbey to her pot-boy, 
run round to Hexam’s, and teU his daughter Lizzie that I 
want to speak to her.” 

“Lizzie Hexam, Lizzie Hexam,” began Miss Potterson, 
“ how often have I held out to you the opportunity of get- 
ting clear of your father, and doing well ? ” 

“ Very often. Miss.” 

“ Very of^n ? Yes ! And I might as well have spoken 
to the iron funnel of the strongest sea-going steamer that 
passes the Fellowship-Porters.” 

“ No, Miss,” Lizzie pleaded ; “ because that would not be 
thankful, and I am.” 

“Lizzie Hexam, Lizzie Hexam, think again. Do you 
know the worst of your father ? ” 

“ Do I know the worst of father ! ” she repeated, opening 
her eyes. 

“ Do you know the suspicions to which your father makes 
himself liable ? Do you know the suspicions that are actual- 
ly about, against him ? ” 

The consciousness of what he habitually did, oppressed 
the eirl heavily, and she slowly cast down her eyes. 


36 


CONDENSED CLASSICS, 


“ Please to tell me what the suspicions are, Miss — ” 

It’s not an easy thing to tell a daughter, but it must be 
told. It is thought by some, then, that your father helps to 
their death a few of those that he finds dead.” 

The relief of hearing what she felt sure was a false sus- 
picion, in place of the expected real and true one, so light- 
ened Lizzie’s breast for the moment, that Miss Abbey was 
amazed at her demeanor. She raised her eyes quickly, 
shook her head, and, in a kind of triumph, almost laughed. 

‘‘ They little know father who talk like that ! And per- 
haps it is some one who has a grudge against father ; some 
one who has threatened father. Is it Eiderhood, Miss ? ” 

‘‘Well; yes, it is.” 

“ Yes ! He was father’s partner, and father broke with 
him, and now he revenges himself. And besides. Miss Ab- 
bey ! — WiU you never, without strong reason, let pass your 
hps what I am going to say ? ” 

She bent forward to say it in a whisper. 

“ I promise,” said Miss Abbey. 

“It was on the night when the Harmon murder was 
found out, through father, just above bridge. And just be- 
low bridge, as we were sculling home, Eiderhood crept out 
of the dark in his boat. And many and many times after- 
wards, when such great pains were taken to come to the 
bottom of the crime, and it never could be come near, I 
thought in my own thoughts, could Eiderhood himself have 
done the murder, and did he purposely let father find the 
body ? It seemed almost wicked and cruel so much as 
think such a thing ; but now that he tries to throw it upon 
father, I go back to it as if it was a truth. Can it be a truth, 
that was put into mind by the dead ? ” 

“ You poor deluded girl,” said Miss Potterson, “ don’t you 
see that you can’t open your mind to particular suspicions of 
one of the two, without opening your mind to general sus- 
picions of the other ? Lizzie, leave him. You needn’t break 
with him altogether, but leave him. Do well away from 
him ; come under my direction. Don’t fling yourself away, 
my girl, but be persuaded into being respectable and happy.” 

In the sound good feeling and good sense of her entreaty, 
Miss Abbey had softened into a soothing tone, and had even 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


37 


drawn her arm around the girl’s waist. But she only re- 
plied, “ Thank you, thank you ! I can’t. I won’t. I must 
not think of it. The harder father is borne upon, the more 
he needs me to lean on.” 

A nd then Miss Abbey became frigid. 

“ I have done what I can,” she said, “ and you must go 
your way. But tell your father one thing : he must not 
come here any more.” 

“ Oh, Miss, will you forbid him the house where I know 
he’s safe ? ” 

“ The Fellowships,” returned Miss Abbey, “ has itself to 
look to, as well as others. I forbid the house to Riderhood, 
and I forbid the house to Gaffer. They are both tarred with 
a dirty brush, and I can’t have the Fellowships tarred with 
the same brush. That’s all I know.” 

“ Good-night, Miss ! ” said Lizzie Hexam, sorrowfully. 

“ Hah ! — Good-night 1 ” returned Miss Abbey with a 
shake of her head. 

“Believe me. Miss Abbey, I am truly grateful all the 
same.” 

“ I can believe a good deal,” returned the stately Abbey, 
“ so I’ll try to believe that too, Lizzie.” 

One thing only was clear to the girl’s mind, as she ran 
home. 

The room was quiet, and the lamp burned on the table. In 
the bunk in the corner her brother lay asleep. She bent over 
him softly, kissed him, and came to the table. 

Very quietly, she placed a chair before the scanty fire, and 
sat down in it, drawing her shawl about her. 

The clock struck two, three, four, and she remained there, 
with a woman’s patience and her own purpose. Between 
four and five, she slipped off her shoes, trimmed the fire spar- 
ingly, put water on to boil, and set the table for breakfast. 
Then she went up the ladder, lamp in hand, and came down 
again, and glided about and about, making a little bundle. 
Lastly, from her pocket, and from the chimney piece, and 
from an inverted basin on the highest shelf, she brought half- 
pence, a few sixpences, fewer shillings, and fell to laborious- 
ly and noiselessly counting them, and setting aside one little 
heap. She was still so engaged, when her brother awoke. 


38 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


The boy completed his dressing, and came and sat down at 
the little breakfast-table. 

“ Charley dear, I have made up my mind that this is the 
right time for your going away from us. You must leave 
father to me, Charley — I will do what I can with him — but 
you must go.” 

“ You don’t stand upon ceremony, I think,” grumbled the 
boy, throwing his bread and butter about, in an ill-humor. 

She made no answer. 

“ I tell you what,” said the boy, bursting out into an angry 
whimpering, “you’re a selfish jade, and you think there’s 
not enough for three of us, and want to get rid of me.” 

“ If you believe so, Charley, — yes, then I believe too that 
I am a selfish jade, and that I think there’s not enough for 
three of us, and that I want to get rid of you.” 

It was only when the boy rushed at her, and threw his 
arms around her neck, that she lost her seK-restraint. 

“ Don’t cry, don’t cry ! I am satisfied to go, Liz. I know 
you send me away for my good.” 

“ 0, Charley, Charley, Heaven above us knows I do ! ” 

“ Y es, yes. Don’t mind what I said. Don’t remember it. 
Kiss me.” 

After a silence, she loosed him, to dry her eyes and regain 
her strong quiet influence. 

“How listen, Charley dear. We both know it must be 
done, and I alone know there is good reason for its being 
done at once. Go straight to the school, and say that you 
and I agreed upon it — that we can’t overcome father’s oppo- 
sition — that father will never trouble them, but will never 
take you back. Show what clothes you have brought, and 
what money, and say that I will send some more money. If 
I can get some in no other way, I will ask a little help of 
those two gentlemen who came here that night.” 

“ I say ! ” cried her brother, quickly, “ don’t you have it of 
that Wray burn one ! ” 

Perhaps a slight additional tinge of red flashed up into her 
face and brow, as with a nod she laid a hand upon his lips to 
keep him silently attentive. 

“ And above all things mind this, Charley : Be sure you 
always speak well of father. Good-bye, my Darling I ” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


39 


Lizzie, looking for her father, saw him coming, and stood 
upon the causeway that he might see her. He had nothing 
with him but his boat, and came on apace. Carrying the 
sculls with Lizzie’s aid, he passed up to his dwelling. 

Sit close to the fire, father, dear, while I cook your 
breakfast. Y ou must be frozen.” 

Well, Lizzie, I ain’t of a glow ; that’s certain. And my 
hands seemed nailed through to the sculls. See how dead 
they are ! ” 

You were not out in the perishing night, I hope, father ?” 

“ No, my dear. Lay aboard a barge, by a blazing coal- 
fire. — Where’s that boy ? ” 

There’s a drop of brandy for your tea, father, if you’ll 
put it in while I turn this bit of meat. If the river was to get 
frozen, there would be a deal of distress; w^ouldn’t there, 
father?” 

Ah ! there’s always enough of that,” said Gafier ; dis- 
tress is for ever a going about, like sut in the air — Ain’t that 
boy up yet ? ” 

“ The meat’s ready now, father. Eat it while it’s hot and 
comfortable. After you have finished, we’ll turn round to 
the fire and talk.” 

But he perceived that he was evaded, and, having thrown 
a hasty angry glance toward the bunk, plucked at a corner 
of her apron and asked : 

What’s gone with that boy ? ” 

“ Father, if you’ll begin your breakfast, I’ll sit by and tell 
you. Don’t be angry, dear. It seems, father, that he has 
quite a gift of learning,” 

Unnat’ral young beggar ! ” said the parent, shaking his 
knife in the air. 

“ — And that having this gift, and not being equally good 
at other things, he has made shift to get some schooling.” 

“ Unnat’ral young beggar ! ” said the parent again, with 
his former action. 

— And that knowing you have nothing to spare, father, 
and not wishing to be a burden on you, he gradually made up 
his mind to go seek his fortune out of learning. He went 
away this morning, father, and he cried very much at going, 
and he hoped you would forgive him.” 


40 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Let him never come a-nigh me to ask me my forgive- 
ness,” said the father, again emphasizing his words with the 
knife. “ Let him never come within sight of my eyes, nor 
yet within reach of my arm. His own father ain’t good 
enough for him. He’s disowned his own father. His own 
father therefore disowns him for ever and ever, as a unnat- 
’ral young beggar.” 

He now clutched his knife overhand, and struck down- 
ward with it at the end of every succeeding sentence. 

Lizzie stopped him with a cry. Looking at her he saw her, 
with a face quite strange to him, shrinking back against the 
wall, with her hands before her eyes. 

“ Father, don’t ! I can’t bear to see you striking with it. 
Put it down ! ” 

He looked at the knife ; but still held it. 

“ Father, it’s too horrible. 0, put it down, put it down ! ” 

He tossed it away, and stood up with his open hands held 
out before him. 

“ What’s come to you, Liz ? Can you think I would strike 
at you with a knife ? ” 

“ Ho, father, no ; you would never hurt me.” 

“What should I hurt?” 

“ Hothing, dear father. On my knees, I am certain, in 
my heart and soul I am certain, nothing ! But it was toO 
dreadful to bear ; for it looked — ” 

The recollection of his murderous figure, combining with 
her trial of last night, and her trial of the morning, caused 
her to drop at his feet, without having answered. 

He had never seen her so before. He raised her with the 
utmost tenderness, calling her the best of daughters, and 
“ my poor pretty creetur.” He laid her head gently down, 
got a pillow and placed it under her dark hair, and sought on 
the table for a spoonful of brandy. There being none left, 
he hurriedly caught up the empty bottle, and ran out. 

He returned as hurriedly as he had gone, wdth the bottle 
still empty. He kneeled down by her, took her head on his 
arm, and moistened her lips with a little water into which he 
dipped his fingers : saying, fiercely, as he looked around, now 
over this shoulder, now over that : 

“ Have we got a pest in the house ? Is there summ’at 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND 


41 


deadly sticking to my clothes ? What’s let loose upon us ? 
Who loosed it?” 


CHAPTER VII. 

S ilas WEGG, being on his road to the Roman Empire, 
approaches it by way of Clerkenwell. He goes in at a 
dark greasy entry, pushes a little greasy dark reluctant side- 
door, and follows the door into a little dark greasy shop. It 
is so dark that nothing can be made out in it, over a little 
counter, but a tallow candle in an old tin candlestick, close 
to the face of a man stooping low in a chair. 

“ Good evening, Mr. V enus. Don’t you remember ? ” 

“ To be sure ! ” says Mr. V enus. “ How do you do ? ” 
Wegg, you know,” that gentleman explains. 

“Yes, yes,” says the other. “ Hospital amputation ? ” 

“ J ust so,” says Mr. W egg. 

“Yes, yes,” quoth Venus. “How do you do? Sit down 
by the fire, and w*arm your — your other one.” 

“And how have I been going on, this long time, Mr. 
Venus?” 

“Very bad,” says Mr. Venus uncompromisingly. 

“ What ? Am I still at home ? ” asks W egg with an air of 
surprise. 

“Always at home. I can’t work you into a miscellane- 
ous one, nohow. Do what I will, you can’t be got to fit. 
Y ou’re casting your eye round the shop, Mr. W egg. Let me 
show you a light. My working bench. My young man’s 
bench. A Wice. Tools. Bones, warious. Skulls, wari- 
ous. Preserved Indian baby. African ditto. Bottled 
preparations, warious. Everything within reach of your 
hand, in good preservation. The mouldy ones a-top. 
What’s in those hampers over them again, I don’t quite re- 
member. Say, human warious. Cats. Articulated Eng- 
lish baby. Dogs. Ducks. Glass eyes, warious. Mum- 
mied bird. Dried cuticle, warious. Oh, dear me ! That’s 
the general panoramic view.” 

Having so held and waved the candle as that all these 
heterogeneous objects seemed to come forward obediently 
when they were named, and then retire again, Mr Venus 


42 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


despondently repeats, “ Oli dear me, dear me ! ” and resumes 
his seat. 

Where am I ? ” asks Mr. Wegg. 

‘‘ You’re somewhere in the back shop across the yard, sir ; 
and speaking quite candidly, I wish I’d never bought you of 
the hospital porter.” 

“ Now, look here, what did you give for me ? ” 

Well,” replied Venus, “you were one of a warious lot, 
and I don’t know.” 

“ What will you take for me ? ” 

“Well,” replied Venus, “ I’m not prepared, at a moment’s 
notice, to tell you, Mr. Wegg.” 

“ Come ! According to your own account I’m not worth 
much,” Wegg reasons persuasively. 

“Not for miscellaneous working in, I grant you, Mr. 
Wegg; but you might turn out waluable yet, as a — as a 
Monstrosity, if you’ll excuse me.” 

Repressing an indignant look, indicative of anything but 
a disposition to excuse him, Silas pursues his point. 

“ I think you know me, Mr. Venus, and I think you know 
I never bargain. I have a prospect of getting on in life and 
elevating myself by my own independent exertions, and 
I shouldn’t like — I tell you openly I should not like — under 
such circumstances, to be what I may call dispersed, a part 
of me here, and a part of me there, but should wish to collect 
myself, like a genteel person.” 

“ It’s a prospect at present, is it, Mr. Wegg ? Then you 
haven’t got the money for a deal about you ? Then I’ll tell 
you what I’ll do with you ; I’ll hold you over. I am a man 
of my word, and you needn’t be afraid of my disposing of 
you. I’ll hold you over. That’s a promise. Oh dear me, 
dear me ! ” 

“You seem very low, Mr. V enus. Is business bad ? ” 

“Never was so good. Not to name myseh as a work- 
man without an equal, I’ve gone on improving myseK in my 
knowedge of Anatomy, till both by sight and by name 
I’m perfect. Mr. Wegg, if you was brought here loose in a 
bag to articulate, I’d name your smallest bones blindfold 
equally with your largest, as fast as I could pick ’em out, and 
I’d sort’ em all, and sort your wertebrae, in a manner that 
would equally surprise and charm you. But it’s the heart 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


43 


that lowers me, it is the heart ! Be so good as to take and 
read that card out loud.” 

Silas receives one from his hand, which Venus takes from 
a wonderful litter in a drawer, and putting on his spectacles, 
reads : 

“‘Mr. Venus,’” 

“ Yes. Go on.” 

“ ‘ Preserver of Animals and Birds,’ ” 

“Yes. Goon.” 

“ ‘ Articulator of human bones.’ ” 

“ That’s it,” with a groan. “ That’s it! Mr. Wegg, I’m 
thirty-two, and a bachelor. Mr. Wegg, I love her. She 
objects to the business. ‘ I do not wish,’ she writes in her 
own hand- writing, ‘ to regard myself, nor yet to be regard- 
ed, in that bony light.’ It lowers me. When I’m equally 
lowered all over, lethargy sets in. Don’t let me detain you, 
Mr. Wegg. I’m not company for any one.” 

“ It is not on that account,” says Silas, rising, “ but be- 
cause I’ve got an appointment. It’s time I was at Har- 
mon’s.” 

“Eh?” said Mr. Venus. “Harmon’s up Battle Bridge 
way ? You ought to be in a good thing, if you’ve worked 
yourself in there. There’s lots of money going, there.” 

“ To think,” says Silas, “ that you should catch it up so 
quick, and know about it. W onderful I ” 

“Not at all, Mr. Wegg. The old gentleman wanted to 
know the nature and worth of everything that was found in 
the dust ; and many’s the bone, and feather, and what not, 
that he’s brought to me.” 

“ Really, now 1 ” 

“ I took an interest in that discovery in the river,” says 
Venus. “ (She hadn’t written her cutting refusal at that 
time.) I’ve got up there — never mind, though.” He broke 
off, and added : 

“ The old gentleman was well known all around here. 
There used to be stories about his having hidden all kinds of 
property in those dust mounds. I suppose there was noth- 
ing in ’em. Probably you know, Mr. W egg ? ” 

“Nothing in ’em,” says Wegg, who has never heard a 
word of this before. 

“ Don’t let me detain you. Good night I ” 


44 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


CHAPTER YIII. 

44‘^/rORHIlSrGr, morning, morning!” said Mr. Boffin, 
IVl with a wave of his hand, as Mr. Mortimer Light- 
wood’s office door was opened by a dismal boy, whose ap- 
propriate name was Blight. “ Grovernor in ? ” 

Mr. Lightwood ain’t in at the present moment, but I ex- 
pect him back very shortly. Would you take a seat in Mr. 
Lightwood’s room, sir, while I look over our Appointment 
Book?” Young Blight made a great shoAv of fetching 
from his desk a long thin manuscript volume, and running 
his fingers down the day’s appointments, murmuring, Mr. 
Aggs, Mr. Baggs, Mr. Caggs, Mr. Daggs, Mr. Faggs, Mr. 
Graggs, Mr. Boffin. Yes, sir ; quite right. Y ou are a little 
before your time, sir. Mr. Lightwood will be in directly.” 
I’m not in a hurry,” said Mr. Boffin. 

“ Thank you, sir. I’ll take the opportunity, if you please, 
of entering your name in our Caller’s Book for the day.” 
Young Blight made another great show of changing the 
volume, taking up a pen, sucking it, dipping it, and running 
over previous entries before he wrote. As, “ Mr. Alley, Mr. 
Bailey, Mr. Calley, Mr. Dailey, Mr. Falley, Mr. Galley, Mr. 
Halley, Mr. Lalley, Mr. Malley. And Mr. Boffin.” 

Strict system here ; eh, my lad ? ” said Mr. Boffin, as he 
was booked. 

“ Yes, sir,” said the boy. “ I couldn’t get on without it.” 

By which he probably meant that his mind would have 
been shattered to pieces without this fiction of an occupa- 
tion. It was the more necessary for his spirits, because, 
being of a sensitive temperament, he was apt to consider 
it personally disgraceful to himself that his master had no 
clients. 

Mr. Boffin sat staring at a little book-case of Law Practice 
and Law Reports, and at a window, and at an empty blue 
bag, and at a stick of sealing-wax, and a pen, and a box of 
wafers, and an apple, and a writing-pad — all very dusty — 
and at a number of inky smears and blots, and at an imper- 
fectly disguised gun-case pretending to be something legal, 
and at an iron box labeled Harmon Estate, until Mr. Light- 
wood appeared. 


OXm MUTUAL FRIEND, 


45 


Mr. Lightwood explained that he came from the proctor’s, 
with whom he had been engaged in transacting Mr. Boffin’s 
affairs, and that, all forms of law having been at length com- 
plied with, he, Mr. Lightwood, had now the great gratifica- 
tion, honor, happiness and so forth, of congratulating Mi. 
Boffin on coming into possession, as residuary legatee, of up- 
wards of one hundred thousand pounds, standing in the 
books of the Governor and Company of the Bank of Eng- 
land, and so forth. 

“ Why, Lord save us ! ” said Mr. Boffin, “ when we come 
to take it to pieces, bit by bit, where’s the satisfactoriness of 
the money ? When the old man does right the poor boy after 
all, the poor boy gets no good of it. He gets made away 
with, at the moment when he’s lifting (as one may say) the 
cup and sarser to his lips. Mr. Lightwood, I will now name 
to you, that on behalf of the poor dear boy, me and Mrs. 
Boffin have stood out against the old man times out of num- 
ber, till he has called us every name he could lay his tongue 
to. The last time me and Mrs. Boffin saw the poor boy, he 
was a child of seven year old. For when he come back to 
make intercession for his sister, me and Mrs. Boffin were 
away overlooking a country contract which was to be sifted 
before carted, and he was come and gone in a single hour. 
I say he was a child of seven year old. He was going away, 
all alone and forlorn, to that foreign school, and he come into 
our place, situate up the yard of the present Bower, to have 
a warm at our fire. There was his little scanty traveling 
clothes upon him. There was his little scanty box outside 
in the shivering wind, which I was going to carry for him 
down to the steamboat, as the old man wouldn’t hear of al- 
lowing a sixpence coach-money.^ The poor child clings to 
Mrs. Boffin for a while, as she clings to him, and then, when 
the old man calls, he says ‘ I must go ! God bless you ! ’ and 
for a moment rests his heart against her bosom, and looks up 
at both of us, as if it was in pain — in agony. Such a look ! 
I went aboard with him (I gave him first what little treat I 
thought he’d like), and I left him when he had fallen asleep 
in his berth, and I came back to Mrs. Boffin. But tell her 
what I would of how I had left him, it all went for nothing, 


4G 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


for, according to her thoughts, he never changed that look 
that he had looked up at us two. But it did one piece of 
good. Mrs. Boffin and me had no child of our own, and had 
sometimes wished that how we had one. But not now. 
‘ We might both of us die,’ says Mrs. Boffin, ‘ and other eyes 
might see that lonely look in our child.’ 

“ Well, sir. So Mrs. Boffin and me grow older and older 
in the old man’s service, living and working pretty hard in it, 
till the old man is discovered dead in his bed. Then Mrs. 
Boffin and me seal up his box, always standing on the table 
at the side of his bed, and having frequently heard tell of the 
Temple as a spot where lawyers’ dust is contracted for, I 
come down here in search of a lawyer to advise, and I see 
your young man up at this present elevation, chopping at the 
flies on the window-sill with his penknife, and I give him a 
Hoy ! not then having the pleasure of your acquaintance, 
and by that means come to gain the honor. Then you, and 
the gentleman in the uncomfortable neck-cloth under the 
little archway in Saint Paul’s Churchyard — ” 

“ Doctors’ Commons,” observed Lightwood. 

‘‘ I understood it was another name,” said Mr. Boffin, 
pausing, “ but you know best. Then you and Doctor Scom- 
mons, you go to work, and you do the thing that’s proper, 
and you and Dr. S. take steps for finding out the poor boy, 
and at last you do find out the poor boy, and me and Mrs. 
Boffin often exchange the observation, ‘We shall see him 
again, under happy circumstances.’ But it was never to be ; 
and the want of satisfactoriness is, that after all the money 
never gets to him.” 

“But it gets,” remarked Lightwood with a languid incli- 
nation of the head, “ into excellent hands.” 

“ It gets into the hancte of me and Mrs. Boffin only this 
very day and hour, and that’s what I’m working round to, 
having waited for this day and hour a’ purpose. Mr. Light- 
wood, here has been a wicked cruel murder. By that mur- 
der me and Mrs. Boffin mysteriously profit. For the ap- 
prehension and conviction of the murderer, we offer a re- 
ward of one tithe of the property — a reward of Ten Thou- 
sand Pound. There is just one other thing. Make me as 
compact a little will as can be reconciled with tightness, 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 47 

leaving the 'whole of the property to ‘my beloved wife, 
Henerietty Boffin, sole executrix.’ ” 

Mr. Lightwood, having taken that instruction, showed 
Mr. Boffin out. 

Jogging along Fleet Street he became aware that he was 
closely tracked and observed by a man of genteel appear- 
ance. 

“ Now then ? ” said Mr. Boffin, stopping short, “ what’s 
the next article ? ” 

“ I beg your pardon, Mr. Boffin.” 

“ My name too, eh ? How did you come by it ? I don’t 
know you. If I don’t mistake, you have followed me from 
my lawyer’s and tried to fix my attention. Say out! 
Have you ? Or haven’t you ? ” 

“ Why have you ? ” 

“ If you will allow me to walk beside you, Mr. Boffin, I 
will tell you. I am afraid my object is a bold one, I am afraid 
it has little of the usual practical world about it, but I vent- 
ure it. You will probably change your manner of living, 
Mr. Boffin, in your changed circumstances. Y ou will prob- 
ably keep a larger house, have many matters to arrange, and 
be beset by numbers of correspondents. If you would try 
me as your Secretary — ” 

“ As what? ” cried Mr. Boffin, with his eyes wide open. 

“Your Secretary.” 

“ Well,” said Mr. Boffin, under his breath, “ that’s a queer 
thing! ” 

“ Or,” pursued the stranger, wondering at Mr. Boffin’s 
wonder, “ if you would try me as your man of business un- 
der any name, I know you would find me faithful and grate- 
ful, and I hope you will find me useful. You may naturally 
think that my immediate object is money. Not so, for I 
would willingly serve you a year — two years — any term 
you might appoint — before that should begin to be a consid- 
eration between us.” 

“ Where do you come from ? ” asked Mr. Boffin. 

“I come,” returned the other, meeting his eye, “from 
many countries.” 

“ From — any particular place ? ” 


48 


VONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ I have been in many places.” 

What have you been ? ” asked Mr. Bofi&n, 

“ I have been a student and a traveler.” 

“ But if it ain’t a liberty to plump it out,” said Mr. Boffin, 

what do you do for your living ? ” 

“ I have mentioned what I aspire to do. I have been su- 
perseded as to some slight intentions I had, and I may say 
that I have now to begin life. All this time,” said the stran- 
ger, producing a card, “ I have not mentioned my name. 
My name is Eokesmith. I lodge at ©ne Mr. Wilfer’s, at Hol- 
loway.” 

‘‘ Father of Miss Bella Wilfer ? ” 

“My landlord has a daughter named Bella. Yes; no 
doubt.” 

“ That’s singular, too ! Well, sir, to tell you the truth, I 
don’t know what to say to you.” 

“ Say nothing,” returned Mr. Rokesmith: “ allow me to 
call on you in a few days.” 

“ That’s fair, and I don’t object,” said Mr. Boffin; “you 
can call at the Bower any time in a week or two. It’s not 
above a mile or so from you, and your landlord can direct 
you to it. But as he may not know it by its new name of 
Boffin’s Bower, say, when you inquire of him, it’s Har- 
mon’s; will you?” 

“ Harmoon’s,” repeated Mr. Rokesmith, seeming to have 
caught the sound imperfectly, “ Harmarn’s. How do you 
spell it?” 

“ Why, as to the spelling of it,” returned Mr. Boffin, with 
great presence of mind, “ that’s your look-out. Harmon’s 
all you’ve got to say to him. Morning, morning, morning ! ” 
And so departed, without looking back. 

CHAPTER IX. 

B ETAKING- himself straight homeward, Mr. Boffin, 
without further let or hinderance, arrived at the Bower, 
and gave Mrs. Boffin (in a walking dress of black velvet and 
feathers, like a mourning coach-horse) an account of all he 
had said and done since breakfast. 

“ This brings us round, my dear,” he then pursued, “ to the 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


49 


question we left unfinished : namely, whether there’s to be 
any new go-in for Fashion.” 

‘‘ Now ril tell you what I want, Noddy,” said Mrs. Boffin, 
smoothing her dress with an air of immense enjoyment, ‘‘ I 
want Society, /say, a good house in a good neighborhood, 
good things about us, good living, and good society. I say, 
live like our means, without extravagance, and be happy. 
Next I think — and I really have been thinking early and 
late — of the disappointed girl ; her that was so cruelly disap- 
pointed, you know, both of her husband and his riches. 
Don’ t you think we might do something for her ? Have her 
to live with us ? Or something of that sort ? ” 

“Ne-ver once thought of the way of doing it!” cried 
Mr. Boffin, smiting the table in his admiration. “ What a 
thinking steam-ingein this old lady is. And she don’t know 
how she does it. Neither does the ingein I ” 

“ Last, and not least, I have taken a fancy. You remem- 
ber dear little John Harmon, before he went to school? 
Over yonder across the yard, at our fire ? Now that he is 
past all benefit of the money, and it’s come to us, I should 
like to find some orphan child, and take the boy and adopt 
him and give him J ohn’s name, and provide for him. Some- 
how it would make me easier, I fancy. Say it’s only a 
whim — ” 

“ But I don’t say so,” interposed her husband. 

“ No, but deary, if you did — ” 

I should be a Beast if I did.” 

That’s as much as to say you agree ? Grood and kind of 
you, and like you, deary I ” 

Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, sitting side by side, with Fashion 
withdrawn to an immeasurable distance, fell to discussing 
how they could best find their orphan. Finally Mrs. Boffin 
suggested application to their clergyman. They resolved 
to call upon the reverend gentleman at once, and to take the 
same opportunity of making acquaintance with Miss Bella 
Wilfer. 

The Reverend Frank Milvey’s abode was a very modest 
abode, because his income was a very modest income. 

With a ready patient face and manner, and yet with a la- 
tent smile that showed a quick enough observation of Mrs. 
4 


50 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Boffin’s dress, Mr. Milvey, in his little book-room — charged 
with sounds and cries as though the six children above were 
coming down through the ceiling, and the roasting leg of 
mutton below were coming up through the floor — listened 
to Mrs. Boffin’s statement of her want of an orphan. 

‘‘ I think we had better take Mrs. Milvey into our Coun- 
cil. Margaretta, my dear ! ” Mrs. Milvey came down. 

‘‘Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, my dear, whose good fortune you 
have heard of. Mrs. Boffin wishes to adopt an orphan, and 
I was thinking, Margaretta, that perhaps old Mrs. Groody’s 
grandchild might answer the purpose.” 

“ Oh my dear Frank ! I don't think,” said Mrs. Milvey, 
“ — and I believe my husband will agree with me when he 
considers it again — that you could possibly keep that orphan 
clean from snuffi Because his grandmother takes so many 
ounces, and drops it over him.” 

“ But he would not be living with his grandmother then, 
Margaretta,” said Mr. Milvey. 

“No, Frank, but it '^ould be impossible to keep her from 
Mrs. Boffin’s house ; and the more there was to eat and drink 
there, the oftener she would go. And she is an inconvenient 
woman. I hope it’s not uncharitable to remember that last 
Christmas Eve she drank eleven cups of tea, and grumbled 
all the time. And she is not a grateful woman, Frank. Y on 
recollect her addressing a crowd outside this house, about 
her wrongs, when, one night after we had gone to bed, she 
brought back the petticoat of new flannel that had been giv- 
en her, because it was too short.” 

“That’s true,” said Mr. Milvey. “I don’t think that 
would do. W ould little Harrison — ” 

“ Oh, Franh! ” remonstrated his emphatic wife. 

“ He has no grandmother, my dear.” 

“No, but I don't think Mrs. Boffin would like an orphan 
who squints so much." 

“ That’s true again,” said Mr. Milvey, becoming haggard 
with perplexity. “ If a little girl would do — ” 

“ But, my dear Frank, Mrs. Boffin wants a boy.” 

“ That’s true again,” said Mr. Milvey. “ Tom Bocker is a 
nice boy ” (thoughtfully). 

“But I douht^ Frank,” Mrs. Milvey hinted, after a little 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


51 


hesitation, “ if Mrs. Boffin wants an orphan quite nineteen, 
who drives a cart and waters the roads.” 

We have orphans, I know,” pursued Mr. Milvey, quite 
with the air as if he might have added “ in stock,” and it was 
resolved that Mr. and Mrs. Milvey should search for an or- 
phan likely to suit. 

“Now, old lady,” said Mr. Boffin, as they resumed their 
seats, “ having made a very agreeable visit there, we’ll try 
Wilfer’s.” 

Three pulls at the bell produced no external result, though 
each was attended by audible sounds of scampering and 
rushing within. At the fourth tug — vindictively adminis- 
tered by the hammer-headed driver, — Miss Lavinia ap- 
peared, emerging from the house in an accidental manner, 
with a bonnet and parasol, as designing to take a contem- 
plative walk. The young lady was astonished to find visit- 
ors at the gate, and expressed her feelings in appropriate 
action. 

“ Here’s Mr. and Mrs. Boffin ! ” growled the hammer- 
headed young man through the bars of the gate, and at the 
same time shaking it, as it he were on view in a menagerie ; 
“ they’ve been here half an hour.” 

“ Who did you say ? ” asked Miss Lavinia. 

“ Mr. and Mrs. Boffin ! ” returned the young man, rising 
into a roar. 

Miss Lavinia tripped up the steps to the house-door, 
trijiped down the steps with the key, tripped across the little 
garden, and opened the gate. “Please to walk in,” said 
Miss Lavinia, haughtily. “ Our servant is out.” 

After waiting a quarter of an hour alone in the family sit- 
ting-room, Mrs. Boffin became aware of the entrance of Mrs. 
Wilfer, majestically faint, and with a condescending stitch 
in her side : which was her company manner. 

“ Pardon me,” said Mrs. Wilfer, after the first salutations, 
and as soon as she had adjusted the handkerchief under her 
chin, and waved her gloved hands, “ to what am I indebted 
for this honor ? ” 

“ To make short of it, ma’am,” returned Mr. Boffin, “ per- 
haps you may be acquainted with the names of me and Mrs. 
Boffin, as having come into a certain property.” 


52 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ I have heard, sir,” returned Mrs. Wilfer, with a dignified 
bend of her head, “ of such being the case.” 

‘‘ And I dare say, ma’am,” pursued Mr. Boffin, “you are 
not very much inclined to take kindly to us ? Mrs. Boffin 
and me, ma’am, are plain people, and we don’t want to pre- 
tend to anything, nor yet to go round and round at any- 
thing ; because there’s always a straight way to everything. 
Consequently, we make this call to say, that we shall be glad 
to have the honor and pleasure of your daughter’s acquaint- 
ance, and that we shall be rejoiced if your daughter will come 
to consider our house in the light of her home equally with 
this. In short, we want to cheer your daughter, and to give 
her the opportunity of sharing such pleasures as we are a go- 
ing to take ourselves. W e want to brisk her up, and brisk 
her about, and give her a change.” 

“That’s it! ” said the open-hearted Mrs. Boffin. “Lor! 
Let’s be comfortable.” 

Mrs. Wilfer bent her head in a distant manner to her lady 
visitor, and with majestic monotony replied to the gentle- 
man : 

“ Pardon me. I have several daughters. Which of my 
daughters am I to understand is thus favored by the kind in- 
tentions of Mr. Boffin and his lady ? ” 

“Don’t you see?” the ever-smiling Mrs. Boffin put in. 
“ Naturally, Miss Bella, you know.” 

“ Oh-h! ” said Mrs. Wilfer, with a severely unconvinced 
look. “ My daughter Bella is accessible and shall speak for 
herself.” Then opening the door a little way, simultaneous- 
ly with a sound of scuttling outside it, the good lady made 
the proclamation, “ Send Miss Bella to me I ” Which proc- 
lamation, though grandly formal, and one might almost say 
heraldic, to hear, was in fact enunciated with her maternal 
eyes reproachfully glaring on that young lady in the flesh — 
and in so much of it that she was retiring with difficulty into 
the small closet under the stairs, apprehensive of the emer- 
gence of Mr. and Mrs. Boffin. 

Miss Bella appeared ; whom Mrs. Wilfer presented, and 
to whom she explained the purpose of the visitors. 

“ I am much obliged to you, I am sure,” said Miss Bella, 
coldly shaking her curls, “ but I doubt if I have the inclina- 
tion to go out at all.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


53 


“ Bella ! ” Mrs. Wilfer admonished her ; “ Bella, you must 
conquer this.” 

“ Yes, do what your Ma says, and conquer it, my dear,” 
urged Mrs. Boffin, “ because we shall be so glad to have you, 
and because you are much too pretty to keep yourself shut 
up.” With that, the pleasant creature gave her a kiss, and 
patted her on her dimpled shoulders. 

‘‘We are going to move into a nice house,” said Mrs. Bof- 
fin, who was woman enough to compromise Mr. Boffin on 
that point, when he couldn’t very well contest it ; “ and we 
are going to set up a nice carriage, and we’ll go everywhere 
and see everything. And you mustn’t,” seating Bella be- 
side her, and patting her hand, “ you mustn’t feel a dislike to 
us to begin with, because we couldn’t help it, you know, my 
dear.” 

With the natural tendency of youth to yield to candor and 
sweet temper. Miss Bella was so touched by the simplicity of 
this address that she frankly returned Mrs. Boffin’s kiss. 

The easy pair proposed to Bella that as soon as they should 
be in a condition to receive her in a manner suitable to their 
desires, Mrs. Boffin should return with notice of the fact. 
This arrangement Mrs. Wilfer sanctioned with a stately in- 
clination of her head and wave of her gloves, as who should 
say, “ Your demerits shall be overlooked, and you shall be 
mercifully gratified, poor people.” 

“ By-the-by, ma’am,” said Mr. Boffin, turning back as he 
was going, “ you have a lodger ? ” 

“ A gentleman,” Mrs. Wilfer answered, qualify ing the low 
expression, “ undoubtedly occupies our first floor.” 

“I may call him Our Mutual Friend,” said Mr. Boffin. 
“ What sort of a fellow is Our Mutual Friend, now ? Do 
you like him ? ” 

“ Mr. Rokesmith is very punctual, very quiet, a very eligi- 
ble inmate.” 

“ Because,” Mr. Boffin explained, “ you must know that 
I’m not particularly well acquainted with Our Mutual 
Friend, for I have only seen him once. Y ou give a good ac- 
count of him. Is he at home ? ” 

“ Mr. Rokesmith is at home,” said Mrs. Wilfer ; “ indeed, 
there he stands at the garden gate. Waiting for you, per- 
haps?” 


54 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ How <xre you, sir, how are you ? ” said Mr. Boffin. “ This 
is Mrs. Boffin. Mr. Rokesmith, that I told you of, my dear.” 

She gave him good day, and he bestirred himself and 
helped her to her seat, and the like, with a ready hand. 

“ Good-bye for the present. Miss Bella,” said Mrs. Boffin, 
calling out a hearty parting. “We shall meet again soon ! 
And then I hope I shall have my little John Harmon to show 
you.” 

Mr. Rokesmith, who was at the wheel adjusting the skirts 
of her dress, suddenly looked behind him, and around him, 
and then looked up at her, with a face so pale that Mrs. Bof- 
fin cried : 

“ Gracious ! ” And after a moment, “ What’s the matter, 
sir ? ” 

“ How can you show her the Head ? ” returned Mr. Roke- 
smith. 

“It’s only an adopted child. One I have told her of. One 
I’m going to give the name to ! ” 

“ You took me by surprise,” said Mr. Rokesmith, “ and it 
sounded like an omen that you should speak of showing the 
Head to one so young and blooming.” 

How, Bella suspected by this time that Mr. Rokesmith 
admired her. Whether the knowledge (for it was rather 
that than suspicion) caused her t# incline to him a little more, 
or a little less, than she had done at first ; whether it render- 
ed her eager to find out more about him, because she sought 
to establish reason for her distrust, or because she sought to 
free liim from it; w^as as yet dark to her own heart. But 
at most times he occupied a great amount of her attention, 
and she had set her attention closely on this incident. 

CHAPTER X. 

^P'HERE is excitement in the V eneering mansion. The 
JL mature young lady is going to be married (powder and 
all) to the mature young gentleman, and she is to be married 
from the Yeneering house, and the Yeneerings are to give 
the breakfast. 

The mature young lady is a lady of property. The mature 
young gentleman is a gentleman of property. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


55 


It would seem that both the mature young lady and the 
mature young gentleman must indubitably be Veneering’s 
oldest friends. 

The morning has passed. The trumpets of fashion have 
described how that on the seventeenth instant, at St. James’s 
Church, the Eeverend Blank Blank, assisted by the Rever- 
end Dash Dash, united in the bonds of matrimony, Alfred 
Lammle, Esquire, of Sackville Street, Piccadilly, to Sophro- 
nia, only daughter of the late Horatio Akershem, Esquire, 
of Yorkshire. Also how the fair bride was married from 
the house of Hamilton Veneering, Esquire, of Stucconia, 
and was given away by Melvin Twemlow, Esquire, of Duke 
Street, St. James’s, second cousin to Lord Snigsworth, of 
Snigsworthy Park. 

And it is all over. 

All over, that is to say, for the time being. But, there is 
another time to come, and it comes in about a fortnight, 
and it comes to Mr. and Mrs. Lammle on the sands at Shank- 
lin, in the Isle of Wight. 

Mr. and Mrs. Lammle have walked for some time on the 
Shanklin sands, and one may see by their footprints that 
they have not w’alked arm in arm, and that they have not 
walked in a straight L ack, and that they have walked in a 
moody humor; for the lad> has prodded little spirting holes 
in the damp sand before her with her parasol, and the gen- 
tleman has trailed his stick after him. As if he were of the 
Mephistopheles family indeed, and had walked with a 
drooping tail. 

“ Do you mean to tell me, then, Sophronia — ” 

Don’t put it upon me, sir. I ask you, do you mean to tell 
me ? Do I mean to say ! ” Mrs. Lammle after a time repeats, 
with indignation. “ Putting it on me I The unmanly dis- 
ingenuousness ! ” 

“The what?” 

Mrs. Lammle replies, “ The meanness.” 

“ That is not what you said. You said disingenuousness.” 

“What if I did?” 

“ There is no ‘ if ’ in the case. Y ou did.” 

“I did then. And what of it ? ” 

“ What of it ? ” says Mr. Lammle. “ Have you the face to 
utter the word to me ? ” 


56 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ The face, too ! ” replied Mrs. Lammle, staring at him 
with cold scorn. “ Pray, how dare you, sir, utter the word 
to me ? ” 

“ I never did.” 

As this happens to he true, Mrs. Lammle is thrown on the 
feminine resource of saying, “ I don’t care what you uttered 
or did not utter.” 

After a little more walking and a little more silence, Mr, 
Lammle breaks the latter. 

“ Do I mean to tell you what ? ” 

“ That you are a man of property ? ” 

“No.” 

“ Then you married me on false pretenses ? ” 

“ So be it. Do you mean to say you are a woman of prop- 
erty ? ” 

“No.” 

“ Then you married me on false pretenses.” 

“ If you were so dull a fortune-huiiter that you deceived 
yourself, or if you were so greedy 'and grasping that you 
were over-willing to be deceived by appearances, is it my 
fault, you adyenturer ? ” 

“ I asked Veneering, and he told me you were rich.” 

“ Veneering ! ” with great contempt. “ And what does 
V eneering know about me ! ” 

“ W as he not your trustee ? ” 

“No. I have no trustee, but the one you saw on the day 
when you fraudulently married me. And this trust is not a 
very difficult one, for it is only an annuity of a hundred and 
fifteen pounds. I think there are some odd shillings or 
pence, if you are very particular.” 

“ Question for question. It is my turn again, Mrs. Lammle. 
What made you suppose me a man of property ? ” 

“ You made me suppose you so. Perhaps you will deny 
that you always presented yourseK to me in that character ?” 

“But you asked somebody, too. Come, Mrs. Lammle, 
admission for admission. Y ou asked somebody ? ’ ’ 

“ I asked Veneering.” 

“ And V eneering knew as much of me as he knew of you, 
or as anybody knows of him.” 

After more silent walking, the bride stops short, to say ir 
a passionate manner : 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


57 


I never will forgive the Y eneerings for this ! ” 

“ Neither will I,” returns the bridegroom. 

“Do you pretend to believe,” Mrs. Lammle resumes, 
sternly, “ Avhen you talk of my marrying you for worldly 
advantages, that it was within the bounds of reasonable 
probability that I would have married you for yourself ? ” 

“ Again there are two sides to the question, Mrs. Lammle. 
What do you pretend to believe ? ” 

“ So you first deceive me and then insult mel ” cries the 
lady, with a heaving bosom. 

“Not at all. I have originated nothing. The double- 
edged question was yours.” 

“ Was mine ! ” the bride repeats, and her parasol breaks 
in her angry hand. 

His color has turned to a livid white, and ominous marks 
have come to light about his nose, as if the finger of the very 
devil himself had, within the last few moments, touched it 
here and there. But he has repressive power, and she has 
none. 

“ Throw it away,” he coolly recommends as to the para- 
sol you have made it useless ; you look ridiculous with it.” 

Whereupon she calls him in her rage, “ A deliberate vil- 
lain,” and so casts the broken thing from her^s that it strikes 
him in falling. The finger-marks are something whiter for 
the instant, but he walks on at her side. 

She bursts into tears, declaring herself the wretchedest, 
the most deceived, the worst-used, of women. Then she 
says that if she had the courage to kill herself, she would do 
it. Then she calls him vile impostor. Then she asks him 
why, in the disappointment of his base speculation, he does 
not take her life with his own hand, under the present favor- 
able circumstances. Then she cries again. Then she is en- 
raged again, and makes some mention of swindlers. Final- 
ly, she sits down crying on a block of stone, and is in all the 
known and unknown humors of her sex at once. Pending 
her changes, those aforesaid marks in his face have come and 
gone, now here now there, like white stops of a pipe on 
which the diabolical performer has played a tune. Also his 
livid lips are parted at last, as if he were breathless with run- 
ning. Yet he is not. 

“ Now, get up, Mrs. Lammle, and let us speak reasonably.” 


58 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Yielding to his hand, she rises, and they walk again ; but 
this time with their faces towards their place of residence. 

“Mrs. Lammle, we have both been deceiving, and we 
have both been deceived. We have both been biting, and 
we have both been bitten. In a nutshell, there’s the state 
of the case. You are now cool enough, Sophronia, to see 
that you can’t be injured without my being equally injured. 
First, then, we must keep this matter to ourselves. You 
agree ? ” 

“ If it is possible, I do.” 

“ Possible ! We have pretended well enough to one an- 
other. Can’t we, united, pretend to the world? Agreed. 
Secondly, we owe the Yeneerings a grudge, and we owe all 
other people the grudge of wishing them to be taken in, as 
we ourselves have been taken in. Agreed ? ” 

“Yes. Agreed.” 

“ We come smoothly to thirdly. You have called me an 
adventurer, Sophronia. So I am. In plain uncompliment- 
ary English, so I am. So are you, my dear. So are many 
people. We agree to keep our own secret, and to work to- 
gether in furtherance of our own schemes.” 

“ What schemes ? ” 

“ Any scheme that will bring us money. By our own 
schemes, I mean our joint interest. Agreed ? ” 

She answers, after a little hesitation, “I suppose so. 
Agreed.” 

“ Carried at once, you see ! Now, to wind up all : — You 
have shown temper to-day, Sophronia. Don’t be betrayed 
into doing so again, because I have a devil of a temper my- 


CHAPTER XI. 

M r. PODSNAP was well to do, and stood very high in 
Mr. Podsnap’s opinion. 

Mr. Podsnap’s world was not a very large world, morally ; 
no, not even geographically : seeing that although his busi- 
ness was sustained upon commerce Avith other countries, 
he considered other countries, Avith that important reserva- 
tion, a mistake, and of their manners and customs would 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


59 


conclusively observe, “ I^ot English ! ” when Pre.jto ! with a 
flourish of the arm, and a flush of the face, they were swept 
away. 

A certain institution in Mr. Podsnap’s mind which he call- 
ed “ the young person ” may be considered to have been 
embodied in Miss Podsnap, his daughter. It was an incon- 
venient and exacting institution, as requiring everything in 
the universe to be filed down and fitted to it. The question 
about everything was, would it bring a blush into the cheek 
of the young person ? 

Said Mr. Podsnap to Mrs. Podsnap, “ Gfeorgiana is almost 
eighteen.” 

Said Mrs. Podsnap to Mr. Podsnap, assenting, “Almost 
eighteen.” 

Said Mr. Podsnap then to Mrs. Podsnap, “ Really I think 
we should have some people on G-eorgiana’s birthday.” 

Said Mrs. Podsnap then to Mr. Podsnap, “ Which will en- 
able us to clear off all those people who are due.” 

So it came to pass that Mr. and Mrs. Podsnap requesteci 
the honor of the company of seventeen friends of their souls 
at dinner. 

Mr. and Mrs. Veneering, and Mr. and Mrs. Veneering’s 
bran-new bride and bridegroom, were of the company. 

The majority of the guests were like the plate, and includ- 
ed several heavy articles weighing ever so much. But there 
was a foreign gentleman among them, whom Mr. Podsnap 
had invited after much debate with himself — believing the 
whole European continent to be in mortal alliance against 
the young person — and there was a droll disposition, not 
only on the part of Mr. Podsnap, but of everybody else, to 
treat him as if he were a child who was hard of hearing. 

As a delicate concession to this unfortunately-born for- 
eigner, Mr. Podsnap, in receiving him, had presented his 
wife as “ Madame Podsnap; ” also his daughter as “Made- 
moiselle Podsnap,” with some inclination to add “ ma fille,” 
in which bold venture, however, he checked himself. The 
Y eneerings being at that time the only other arrivals, he had 
added (in a condescendingly explanatory manner), “Mon- 
sieur Y ey-nairreeng,” and had then subsided into English. 

“ How Do You Like London ? ” Mr. Podsnap now inquir- 


GO 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


ed from his station of host, as if he were administering some- 
thing in the nature of a powder or potion to the deaf child ; 
“ London, Londres, London ? ” 

The foreign gentleman admired it. 

You find it Very Large ? ” said Mr. Podsnap, spaciously. 

The foreign gentleman found it very large. 

‘‘And Very Rich?” 

The foreign gentleman found it, without doubt, enorme- 
ment riche. 

“Enormously Rich, We say,” returned Mr. Podsnap, in a 
condescending manner. “ Our English adverbs do Not ter- 
minate in Mong, and We Pronounce the ‘eh’ as if there 
were a ‘ t ’ before it. W e Say Ritch.” 

“ Reetch,” remarked the foreign gentleman. 

“ And Do You Find, Sir,” pursued Mr. Podsnap, with dig- 
nity, “ Many Evidences that Strike You, of our British Con- 
stitution in the Streets Of The World’s Metropolis, London, 
Londres, London ? ” 

. The foreign gentleman begged to be pardoned, but did 
not altogether understand. 

“ The Constitution Britannique,” Mr. Podsnap explained, 
as if he were teaching in an infant school. “We Say Brit- 
ish, But You Say Britannique, You Know,” (forgivingly, as 
if that were not his fault). “ The Constitution, Sir.” 

The foreign gentleman said, “ Mais, Yees ; I know eem.” 

“I Was Inquiring,” said Mr. Podsnap, “Whether You 
Have Observed in our Streets as We should say. Upon our 
Pavvy as You would say, any Tokens — ” 

The foreign gentleman, with patient courtesy, entreated 
pardon; “ But what was tokenz ? ” 

“ Marks,” said Mr. Podsnap ; “ Signs, you know, Appear- 
ances — Traces.” 

“ Ah ! of a Orse ? ” inquired the foreign gentleman. 

“ We call it Horse,” said Mr. Podsnap, with forbearance. 
“In England, Angleterre, England, We Aspirate The' ‘ H,’ 
and We Say ‘ Horse.’ Only our Lower Classes Say ‘ Orse ! ’” 

“Pardon,” said the foreign gentleman; “I am alwiz 
wrong! ” 

“ Our Language,” said Mr. Podsnap, with a gracious con- 
sciousness of being always right, “ is Difficult. Ours is a Co- 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


61 


pious Language, and Trying to Strangers. I will not Pur- 
sue my Question. It merely referred to Our Constitution, 
Sir. We Englishmen are Very Proud of our Constitution, 
Sir. It Was Bestowed Upon Us By Providence. No Oth- 
er Country is so Favored as This Country.” 

“And ozer countries? ” — the foreign gentleman was be- 
ginning, when Mr. Podsnap put him right again. 

“We do not say Ozer ; Ave say Other ; the letters are ^ T ’ 
and ‘ H ; ’ You say Tay and Aish, You Know ; ” (still with 
clemency). “ The sound is ^ th ’ — ^ th ! ’ ” 

“And other countries,” said the foreign gentleman. 
“ They do how ? ” 

“ They do, sir,” returned Mr. Podsnap, gravely shaking 
his head ; “ they do — I am sorry to be obliged to say it — as 
they do.” 

“ It was a little particular of Providence,” said the foreign 
gentleman, laughing ; “ for the frontier is not large.” 

“ Undoubtedly,” assented Mr. Podsnap ; “ But So it is. It 
Avas the Charter of the Land. This Island was Blest, Sir, to 
the Direct Exclusion of such Other Countries as — as there 
may happen to be. And if we were all Englishmen present, 
I would say,” added Mr. Podsnap, looking round upon his 
compatriots, and sounding solemnly with his theme, “ that 
there is in the Englishman a combination of qualities, a mod- 
esty, an independence, a responsibility, a repose, combined 
with an absence of everything calculated to call a blush into 
the cheek of a young person, Avhich one Avould seek in vain 
among the Nations of the Earth.” 

Having delivered this little summary, Mr. Podsnap’s face 
flushed as he thought of the remote possibility of its being at 
all qualified by any prejudiced citizen of any other country ; 
and, Avith his favorite right-arm flourish, he put the rest of 
Europe and the whole of Asia, Africa, and America no- 
where. 

The-audience were much edified by this passage of words ; 
and Mr. Podsnap, feeling that he was in rather remarkable 
force to-day, became smiling and conversational. 

“ Has anything more been heard. Veneering,” he inquir- 
ed, “ of the lucky legatee ? ” 

“Nothing more,” returned Veneering, “than that he has 


62 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


come into possession of the property. I am told people now 
call him The Golden Dustman. I mentioned to you some 
time ago, I think, that the young lady whose intended hus- 
band was murdered is daughter to a clerk of mine ? ” 

“ Yes, you told me that,” said Podsnap ; “ and by-the-bye, 
I wish you would tell it again here, for it’s a curious coinci- 
dence — curious that the first news of the discovery should 
have been brought straight to your table (when I was there), 
and curious that one of your people should have been so 
nearly interested in it. Just relate that, will you ? ” 

Veneering was more than ready to do it, for he had pros- 
pered exceedingly upon the Harmon Murder, and had 
turned the social distinction it conferred upon him to the ac- 
count of making several dozen of bran-new bosom-friends. 
So, addressing himself to the most desirable of his neighbors, 
while Mrs. V eneering secured the next most desirable, he 
plunged into the case, and emerged from it twenty minutes 
afterwards with a Bank Director in his arms. Then Mrs. 
V eneering had to relate, to a larger circle, how she had been 
to see the girl, and how she was really pretty, and (consider- 
ing her station) presentable. 

The Lammles were so fond of the dear Veneerings that 
they could not for some time detach themselves from these 
excellent friends ; but at length, either a very open smile on 
Mr. Lammle’s part, or a very secret elevation of one of his 
gingerous eyebro^^s — certainly one or the other — seemed to 
say to Mrs. Lammle, “ Why don’t you play ? ” And so, 
looking about her, she saw Miss Podsnap, and seeming to 
say responsively, “ That card ? ” and to be answered “Yes,” 
went and sat beside Miss Podsnap for the. rest of the enter- 
tainment. 

“We rpust be going with the rest,” observed Mrs.Lammle, 
rising with a show of unwillingness, amidst a general disper- 
sal. “We are real friends, Georgiana dear ? ” 

“Real.” 

“ Good-night, dear girl ! ” 

She had established an attraction over the shrinking na- 
ture upon which her smiling eyes were fixed, for Georgiana 
held her hand while she answered in a secret and half -fright- 
ened tone : 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


63 


Don’t forget me when you are gone away. And come 
again soon. Grood-night ! ” 

Charming to see Mr. and Mrs. Lammle taking leave so 
gracefully, and going down the stairs so lovingly and sweet- 
ly. hr ot quite so charming to see their smiling faces fall and 
brood as they dropped nioodily into separate corners of their 
little carriage. 

Sophronia, are you awake ? ” 

Am I likely to be asleep, sir ? ” 

Attend to what I am going to say. Keep close to that 
idiot girl. Keep her under your thumb. Y ou have her fast, 
and you are not to let her go. Do you hear ? ” 

“ I hear you.” 

“ I foresee there is money to be made out of this, besides 
taking that fellow down a peg. W e owe each other money, 
you know.” 

CHAPTER XII. 

M r. MORTIMER LIGHTWOOD and Mr. Eugene 
Wray burn had taken a coffee-house dinner in Mr. 
Lightwood’s office. They had newly agreed to set up a joint 
establishment. They had taken a bachelor cottage near 
Hampton, on the brink of the Thames, with a lawn, and a 
boat-house, and all things fitting, and were to float with the 
stream through the summer and a long vacation. 

Young Blight was gone, the coffee-house waiter was 
gone, the plates and dishes were gone, the wine was going — 
but not in the same direction. 

The wind sounds up here,” quoth Eugene, stirring the 
fire, as if we were keeping a lighthouse. 1 wish we were.” 
Don’t you think it would bore us ? ” Lightwood asked. 

“ Not more than any other place. If we were on an iso- 
lated rock in a stormy sea,” said Eugene, smoking with his 
eyes on the fire, “ Lady Tippins couldn’t put off to visit us, 
or, better still, might put off and get swamped. People 
couldn’t ask one to wedding breakfasts. There would be 
no Precedents to hammer at, except the plain-sailing Prec- 
edent of keeping the light up. It would be exciting to look 
out for wrecks.” 


64 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ But otherwise,” suggested Lightwood, “ there might be 
a degree of sameness in the life.” 

“ I have thought of that also,” said Eugene, “ but it would 
not extend beyond two people. Now, it’s a question with 
me, Mortimer, whether a monotony defined with that pre- 
cision and limited to that extent, m^ht not be more endura- 
ble than the unlimited monotony ofone’s fellow-creatures.” 

As Lightwood laughed and passed the wine, he remarked, 
“We shall have an opportunity, in our boating summer, of 
trying the question.” 

“An imperfect one,” Eugene acquiesced, with a sigh, 
“ but so we shall. I hope we may not prove too much for 
one another.” 

“ Now, regarding your respected father,” said Lightwood, 
bringing him to a subject they had expressly appointed to 
discuss: always the most slippery eel of eels of subjects to 
lay hold of. 

“ Yes, regarding my respected father,” assented Eugene, 
settling himself in his arm-chair. “ My respected father has 
found, down the parental neighborhood, a wife for his not- 
generally-respected son.” 

“With some money, of course ? ” 

“ With some money, of course, or he would not have 
found her.” 

“ Do you know her ? ” 

“ Not in the least.” 

“ Hadn’t you better see her ? ” 

“My dear Mortimer, you have studied my character. 
Could I possibly go down there, labeled ‘Eligible. On 
VIEW,’ and meet the lady, similarly labeled? Anything to 
carry out M. R. F.’s arrangements, I am sure, with the great- 
est pleasure — except matrimony. Could I possibly support 
it ? I, so soon bored, so constantly, so fatally ? ” 

“ But you are not a consistent fellow, Eugene.” 

“ In susceptibility to boredom,” returned that worthy, “ I 
assure you I am the most consistent of mankind.” 

It had grown darker as they talked, and the wind was 
sawing and the sawdust was whirling outside paler win- 
dows. The underlying church-yard was already settling into 
deep dim shade, and the shade was creeping up to the house- 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


65 


tops among which they sat. “ As if,” said Eugene, “ as if 
the church-yard ghosts were rising.” 

He had walked to the window with his cigar in his mouth, 
to exalt its flavor by comparing the fireside with the outside, 
when he stopped midway on his return to his arm-chair, and 
said : 

Apparently one of the ghosts has lost its way, and 
dropped in to be directed. Look at this phantom ! ” 

Lightwood turned his head, and there, in the darkness of 
the entry, stood a something in the likeness of a man : to 
whom he addressed the not irrelevant inquiry, “ Who the 
devil are you ? ” 

“ I ask your pardons. Governors,” replied the ghost, in a 
hoarse double-barreled whisper, “ but might either on you 
be Lawyer Lightwood ? ” 

“ One of us is,” said the owner of that name. 

“ All right, Governors Both,” returned the ghost, careful- 
ly closing the room door ; “ ’tickler business.” 

Mortimer lighted the candles. They showed the visitor 
to be an ill-looking visitor with a squinting leer, who, as he 
spoke, fumbled at an old sodden fur cap, formless and man- 
gy, that looked like a furry animal, dog or cat, puppy or kit- 
ten, drowned and decaying. 

“ How,” said Mortimer, “ what is it ? ” 

“ Governors Both,” returned the man, in what he meant 
to be a wheedling tone, “ which on you might be Lawyer 
Lightwood? ” 

“lam.” 

“ Lawyer Lightwood,” ducking at him with a servile air, 
“ I am a man as gets my living, and as seeks to get my living, 
by the sweat of my brow. H ot to risk being done out of the 
sweat of my brow, by any chances, I should wish afore go- 
ing further to be swore in.” 

“ I am not a swearer in of people, man.” 

The visitor, clearly anything but reliant on this assurance, 
doggedly muttered “ Alfred David.” 

“ Is that your name ? ” asked Lightwood. 

“ My name ? ” returned the man. “ Ho ; I want to take 
a Alfred David.” 

(Which Eugene, smoking and contemplating him, inter- 
preted as meaning Affidavit.) 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


^6 


I tell you, my good fellow,” said Lightwood, with his in- 
dolent laugh, “ that I have nothing to do with swearing.” 

He can swear a^you,” Eugene explained; “ and so can I. 
But we can’t do more for you.” 

Much discomfited by this information, the visitor turned 
the drowned dog or cat, puppy or kitten, about and about, 
and looked from one of the (xovernors Both to the other of 
the Grovernors Both, while he deeply considered within him- 
self. At length he decided : 

“ Then I must be took down in pen and ink.” 

“ First, let us know what your business is about.” 

“It’s about,” said the man, taking a step forward, drop- 
ping his hoarse voice, and shading it with his hand, “it’s 
about from five to ten thousand pound reward. That’s what 
it’s about. It’s about Murder. That’s what it’s about.” 

“ Come nearer the table. Sit down.” 

Deferring to the man’s sense of the binding po:^-^rs of pen 
and ink and paper, Lightwood nodded accept^idtce of Eu- 
gene’s nodded proposal to take those spells in hand. Eu- 
gene, bringing them to the table, sat down as clerk or notary. 

“ How,” said Lightwood, “ what’s your name ? ” 

“ Roger Riderhood.” 

“ Dwelling-place ? ” 

“ Lime’us Hole.” 

“ Calling or occupation ? ” 

Hot quite so glib with this answer as with the previous 
two, Mr. Riderhood gave in the definition, “Waterside 
character.” 

“ Anything against you ? ” Eugene quietly put in, as he 
wrote. 

Rather baulked, Mr. Riderhood evasively remarked, with 
an innocent air, that he believed the T’other Glovernor had 
asked him summa’t. 

“ Ever in trouble ? ” said Eugene. 

“Once.” (Might happen to any man, Mr. Riderhood 
added incidentally.) 

“ On suspicion of — ? ” 

“ Of seaman’s pocket,” said Mr. Riderhood. “ Whereby 
I was in reality the man’s best friend, and tried to take care 
of him.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND^ 


67 


“ With the sweat of your brow ? ” asked Eugene. 

it poured down like rain,” said Roger Riderhood, 
“ Now let me be took down again. I give information that 
the man that done the Harmon Murder is Gaffer Hexam, 
the man that found the body. The haiid of Jesse Hexam, 
commonly called Gaffer on the river and along shore, is the 
hand that done that deed. His hand and no other. ’ ’ 

“ Tell us on what grounds you make this accusation,” 
said Mortimer Lightwood. 

“ On the grounds,” answered Riderhood, wiping his face 
with his sleeve, “ that I was Gaffer’s pardner, and suspected 
of him many a long day and many a dark night. On the 
grounds that I knowed his ways. On the grounds that I 
broke the pardnership because I see the danger ; which I 
warn you his daughter may tell you another story about 
that, for anythink I can say, but you know what it’ll be 
worth, for she’d tell you lies, the world round and the heav- 
ens broad, to save her father. On the grounds that it’s well 
understood along the cause’ays and the stairs that he done 
it. On the grounds that he’s fell off from, because he done 
it. On the grounds that I will swear he done it. On the 
grounds that you may take me where you will, and get me 
sworn to it. I don’t want to back out of the consequences. 
I have made up my mind. Take me anywheres.” 

“ All this is nothing,” said Lightwood. 

“Nothing ? ” repeated Riderhood. 

“ Merely nothing. It goes to no more than that you sus- 
pect this man of the crime. You may do so with some rea- 
son, or you may do so with no reason, but he cannot be con- 
victed on your suspicion.” 

“ Haven’t I said from the first minute that I opened my 
mouth in this here world-without-end-everlasting chair 
that I was willing to swear that he done it ? Haven’t I 
said. Take me and get me sworn to it ? Don’t I say so now ? 
Y ou won’t deny it. Lawyer Lightwood ? ” 

“ Surely not ; but you only offer to swear to your suspi- 
cion, and I teU you it is not enough to swear to your suspi- 
cion.” 

“ Not enough, ain’t it. Lawyer Lightwood ? ” he cautious- 
ly demanded. 


68 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Positively not.” 

’ “ And did I say it was enough ? Now, I appeal to the 
T’other Grovernor. Now, fair ! Did I say so ? ” 

“ He certainly has not said that he had no more to tell,” 
Eugene observed. 

“ Gro on then,” said Lightwood. “ Say out what you have 
to say. No after- thought.” 

“ Let me be took down then ! ” cried the informer, eager- 
ly and anxiously. Let me be took down, for by George 
and the Draggin I’m a coming to it now ! Don’t do nothing 
to keep back from a honest man the fruits of the sweat of his 
brow I I give information, then, that he told me that he 
done it. Is that enough ? ” 

“ Take care what you say, my friend,” said Mortimer. 

“ Lawyer Lightwood, take care, you, what I say ; for I 
judge you’ll be answerable for follering it up!” Then, 
slowly and emphatically beating it all out with his open right 
hand on the palm of his left ; I, Eoger Eiderhood, Lime’us 
Hole, Waterside character, tell you. Lawyer Lightwood, 
that the man Jesse Hexam, commonly called upon the river 
and along shore Gaffer, told me that he done the deed. 
What’s more, he told me with his own lips that he done the 
deed. What’s more, he said that he done the deed. And I’ll 
swear it! ” 

“ Where did he tell you so ? ” 

“ Outside the door of the Six Jolly Fellowships, towards 
a quarter arter twelve o’clock at midnight — but I will not 
in my conscience undertake to swear to so fine a matter as 
five minutes — on the night when he picked up the body. 
The Six Jolly Fellowships stands on the spot still. The Six 
Jolly Fellowships won’t run away. If it turns out that he 
warn’ tat the Six JoUy Fellowships that night at midnight, 
I’m a liar.” 

'‘What did he say?” 

“ I’ll ocll you (take me down. T’other Governor, I ask no 
better). He come out first ; I come out last. I might be a 
minute arter him ; I might be half a minute, I might be a 
quarter of a minute ; I cannot swear to that and therefore I 
won’t. That’s knowing the obligations of a Alfred David 
ain’t it ? ” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


69 


“ Go on.” 

“ I found him a waiting to speak to me. He sayS to. me, 

‘ Rogue Riderhood ’ — for that’s the name I’m mostly called 
by — not for any meaning in it, for meaning it has none, but 
because of its being similar to Roger.” 

“ Never mind that.” 

‘‘ Sense me. Lawyer Lightwood, it’s a part of the truth, and 
as such I do mind it, and I must mind it and I will mind it. 

‘ Rogue Riderhood,’ he says, ‘ words passed betwixt us on the 
river to-night.’ Which they had ; ask his daughter ! ‘ I 

threatened you,’ he says, ‘ to chop you over the fingers with 
my boat’s stretcher, or take a aim at your brains wdth my 
boat-hook. I did so on accounts of your looking too hard at 
what I had in tow, as if you was suspicious, and on accounts 
of your holding on to the gunwale of my boat.’ I says to 
him, ‘ Gaffer, I know it.’ He says to me, ‘ Rogue Riderhood, 
you are a man in a dozen’ — I think he said in a score, but of 
that I am not positive, so take the lowest figure, for precious 
be the obligations of a Alfred David. ‘ And,’ he says, ‘ when 
your fellow-men is up, be it their lives or be it their watches, 
sharp is ever the word with you. Had you suspicions ? ’ 
I says, ‘ Gaffer, I had ; and what’s more, I have.’ He falls 
a shaking, and he says, ^ Of what? ’ I says, ‘ Of foul play.’ 
He falls a shaking worse, and he says, ‘ There was foul play 
then. I done it for his money. Don’t betray me ! ’ Those 
were the words as ever he used.” 

There was a silence, broken only by the fall of the ashes 
in the grate. 

“ What more ? ” asked Lightwood. 

“ Of him, d’ye mean, Lawyer Lightwood ? ” 

Of anything to the purpose.” 

‘‘Now, I’m blest if I understand you. Governors Both,” 
said the informer, in a creeping manner : propitiating both, 
though only one had spoken. “What? Ain’t that 
enough ? ’ ” 

“ Did you ask him how he did it, where he did it, when he 
did it?” 

“Far be it from me, Lawyer Lightwood! I was so 
troubled in my mind, that I wouldn’t have knowed more, 
no, not for the sum as I expect to earn from you by the 


70 . 


CONDEJSSED CLASSICS. 


sweat of my brow, twice told ! I bad put an end to the 
pardnership. I had cut the connection. I couldn’t undo 
what was done ; and when he begs and prays, ‘ Old pardner, 
on my knees, don’t split upon me ! ’ I only makes answer 
‘ Never speak another word to Roger Riderhood, nor look 
him in the face ! ’ and I shuns that man.” 

“You have been troubled in your mind a long time, 
man ? ” said Mortimer. 

“Hages!” 

“When all that stir was made, when the Grovernment re- 
ward was offered, when the police were on the alert, when 
the whole country rang with the crime ! ” said Mortimer. 

“ Hah ! ” Mr. Rideroood very slowly and hoarsely chimed 
in, “ warn’t I troubled in my mind then ! ” 

“ But he hadn’t,” said Eugene, drawing a lady’s head up- 
on his writing-paper, and touching it at intervals, “ the op- 
portunity then of earning so much money, you see.” 

“ The T’other G-overnor hits the nail, Lawyer Lightwood ! 
It was that as turned me. I had many times and again strug- 
gled to relieve myself of the trouble on my mind, but! 
couldn’t get it off. I had once very nigh got it off to Miss 
Abbey Potterson which keeps the Six Jolly Fellowships — 
there is the ’ouse, it won’t run away, — there lives the lady, 
she ain’t likely to be struck dead afore you get there — ask 
her ! — but I couldn’t do it. At last, out comes the neAV bil] 
with your own lawful name. Lawyer Lightwood, printed to 
it, and then I asks the question of my own intellects. Am I 
to have this trouble on my mind for ever ? Am I never to 
throw it off ? Am I always to think more of Graffer than of 
myself ? If he’s got a daughter, ain’t 1 got a daughter ? ” 

“ And echo answered — ” Eugene suggested. 

“ You have,” said Mr. Riderhood, in a firm tone. 

“ Incidentally mentioning, at the same time, her age ? ” in- 
quired Eugene. 

“ Yes, governor. Two-and-twenty last October. And 
then I put it to myself, ‘ Regarding the money. It is a pot of 
money.’ For it is a pot,” said Mr. Riderhood, with candor, 
“ and why deny it ? Sol made up my mind to get my troub- 
le off my mind, and to earn by the sweat of my brow what 
was held out to me. And what’s more,” he added, suddenly 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEXD. 


71 


turning bloodthirsty, ‘‘ I mean to have it ! And nov^ I tell 
you, once and away, Lawyer Lightwood, that Jesse Hexam, 
commonly called G-afFer, his hand and no other, done the 
deed, on his own confession to me. And I give him up to 
you, and I want him took. This night ! ” 

Lightwood leaned over his friend, and said in a whisper : 

“ I suppose I must go with this fellow to our imperturba- 
ble friend at the police-station. ’ ’ 

“ I suppose,” said Eugene, “ there is no help for it.” 

“ Do you believe him ? ” 

“ I believe him to be a thorough rascal. But he may tell 
the truth for his own purpose, and for this occasion only. 
You mentioned (twice, I think,) a daughter of this Hex- 
am’s,” said Eugene. “ You don’t mean to imply that she had 
any guilty knowledge of the crime ? ” 

The honest man, after considering — perhaps considering 
how his answer might affect the fruits of the sweat of his 
brow — replied, unreservedly, “Ko, I don’t.” 

And you implicate no other person ? ” 

“ It ain’t what I implicate, it’s what Graffer implicated,” 
was the dogged and determined answer. “ I don’t pretend 
to know more than that his words to me was, ‘ I done it.’ 
Those was his words.” 

“I must see this out, Mortimer,” whispered Eugene, ris- 
ing. “ How shall we go ? ” 

“ Let us walk,” whispered Lightwood, and give this fel- 
low time to think of it.” 

Eogue Riderhood led the way until they came to the po- 
lice-station. Mr. Inspector recognized the friends the in- 
stant they reappeared. 

Mortimer Lightwood asked him, would he be so good as 
to look at those notes ? Handing him Eugene’s. 

“ Have you heard these read ? ” he then demanded of the 
honest man. 

“No,” said Riderhood. 

“ Then you had better hear them.” And so read them 
aloud, in an official manner. 

“ Are these notes correct, now, as to the information you 
bring here and the evidence you mean to give ? ” he asked, 
when he had finished reading. 


72 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ They are. They are as correct,” returned Mr. Rider- 
hood, “ as I am. I can’t say more than that for ’em.” 

“ I’ll take this man, myself, sir,” said Mr. Inspector to 
Lightwood. Then to Riderhood, “ Is he at home ? Where 
is he ? What’s he doing ? Make it your business to know 
all about him.” 

Riderhood promised to find out in a few minutes. 

“Stop,” said Mr. Inspector; “not till I tell you. We 
mustn’t look like business. Would you two gentlemen ob- 
ject to making a pretense of taking a glass of something in 
my company at the Fellowships ? You can’t do better than 
be interested in some lime works anywhere down about 
Northfleet, and doubtful whether some of your lime don’t 
get into bad company as it comes up in barges.” 

“You hear, Eugene,” said Lightwood over his shoulder. 
“ You are deeply interested in lime.” 

“ Without lime,” returned that unmoved barrister-at-law, 
“ my existence would be unilluminated by a ray of hope.” 

CHAPTER XIII. 

T he two lime merchants, with their escort, entered the 
dominions of Miss Abbey Potterson. 

“ Speaking as a shipper of lime,” began Eugene, “ I beg to 
observe that if this missing lime could be got hold of without 
any young female relative of any distinguished gentleman 
engaged in the lime trade (which I cherish next to my life) 
being present, I think it might be a more agreeable proceed- 
ing to the assisting bystanders, that is to say, lime-burners.” 

“ I also,” said Lightwood, pushing his friend aside with a 
laugh, “ should much prefer that.” 

“ It shall be done, gentlemen, if it can be done conven- 
iently,” said Mr. Inspector, with coolness. “ There is no 
wish on my part to cause any distress in that quarter. In- 
deed, I am sorry for that quarter.” 

“ There was a boy in that quarter,” remarked Eugene. 
“ He is still there ? ” 

“ JSTo,” said Mr. Inspector. “ He has quitted those works. 
He is otherwise disposed of.” 

“ Will she be left alone then ? ” asked Eugene. 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND, 


73 


She will be left,” said Mr. Inspector, “ alone;” 

Two taps were now heard on the outside of the window. 
Mr. Inspector strolled out with a noiseless foot and an unoc- 
cupied countenance. As one might go to survey the weath- 
er and the general aspect of the heavenly bodies. 

“ This is becoming grim, Mortimer,” said Eugene, in a lo'V^ 
voice. “ I don’t like this.” 

“ Nor I,” said Lightwood. “ Shall we go ? ” 

“ Being here, let us stay. You ought to see it out, and I 
won’t leave you. Besides, that lonely girl with the dark 
hair runs in my head. It was little more than a glimpse we 
had of her that last time, and yet I almost see her waiting by 
the fire to-night. Do you feel like a dark combination of 
traitor and pickpocket when you think of that girl ? ” 

“ Rather,” returned Lightwood. “ Do you ? ” 

“ Very much so.” 

Their escort strolled back again,, and reported. Divested 
of its various lime-lights and shadows, his report went to the 
effect that Gfaffer was away in his boat, supposed to be on 
his old look-out ; that he had been expected last high Avater ; 
that having missed it for some reason or other, he was not, 
according to his usual habits at night, to be counted on be- 
fore next high water, or it might be an hour or so later ; that 
his daughter, surveyed through the Avindow, would seem to 
be so expecting him^ for the supper was not cooking, but set 
out ready to be cooked; that it would be high Avater at 
about one, and that it was now barely ten ; that there AA^as 
nothing to be done but watch and wait ; that the informer 
was keeping watch at the instant of that present reporting, 
but that tAvo heads were better than one (especially when 
the second was Mr. Inspector’s) ; and that the reporter 
meant to share the watch. And forasmuch as crouching 
under the lee of a hauled-up boat on a night when it blew 
cold and strong, and when the weather was varied with 
blasts of hail at tim*es, might be wearisome to amateurs, the 
reporter closed with the recommendation that the tAVO gen- 
tlemen should remain, for a Avhile at any rate, in their pres- 
ent quarters, which were weather-tight and warm. 

They were not inclined to dispute this recommendation, 
but they wanted to knoAV where they could join the watch- 


74 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


ers when so disposed. Rather than trust to a verbal descrip- 
tion of the place, which might mislead, Eugene (with a less 
weighty sense of personal trouble on him than he usually 
had) would go out with Mr. Inspector, note the spot, and 
come back. 

On the shelving bank of the river, among the slimy stones 
of a causeway — very near to the old windmill which was the 
denounced man’s dwelling-place — were a few boats; some 
moored and already beginning to float; others, hauled up 
above the reach of the tide. Under one of these latter, Eu- 
gene’s companion disappeared. And when Eugene had 
made sure that he could not miss it, he turned his eyes upon 
the building where, as he had been told, the lonely girl with 
the dark hair sat by the fire. 

That part of the bank having rank grass growing on it, 
there was no difficulty in getting close, without any noise of 
footsteps : it was but to scramble up a ragged face of pretty 
hard mud three or four feet high and come upon the grass 
and to the window. He came to the window by that means. 

She had no other light than the light of the fire. The un- 
kindled lamp stood on the table. She sat on the ground, 
looking at the brazier, with her face leaning on her hand. 
There was a kind of film or flicker on her face, which at first 
he took to be the fitful firelight ; but, on a second look, he 
saw that she was weeping. A sad and solitary spectacle, as 
shown him by the rising and the falling of the fire. A deep 
rich piece of color, with the brown flush of her cheek and 
the shining lustre of her hair, though sad and solitary, weep- 
ing by the rising and the falling of' the fire. 

She started up. He had been so very still, that he felt 
sure it was not he who had disturbed her, so merely with- 
drew from the window and stood near it in the shadow of 
the wall She opened the door, and said in an alarmed 
tone, ^‘Father, was that you calling me?” And again, 
“Father]” And once again, after listening, “Father! I 
thought I heard you call me twice before ! ” 

ISTo response. As she re-entered the door, he dropped 
ever the bank and made his way back, among the ooze and 
near the hiding-place, to Mortimer Lightwood : to wffiom he 
told wloat he had seen of the girl, and how this was becoming 
very grim indeed. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 75 

“ If the real man feels as guilty as I do,” said Eugene, “ he 
is remarkably uncomfortable.” 

“ Influence of secrecy,” suggested Lightwood. 

“ I am not at all obliged to it for making me Guy Fawkes 
in the vault and a Sneak in the area both at once,” said Eu- 
gene. “ Give me seme more of that stuff.” 

Lightwood helped him to some more of that stuff, but it 
had been cooling, and didn’t answer now. 

“Pooh,” said Eugene, spitting it out among the ashes. 
“ Tastes hke the wash of the river.” 

“ Are you so familiar with the flavor of the wash of the 
river ? ” 

“ I seem to be to-night. I feel as if I had been hah 
drowned, and swallowed a gallon of it.” 

“ Influence of locality,” suggested Lightwood. 

“You are mighty learned to-night, you and your influ- 
ences,” returned Eugene. “ How long shall we stay here ? ” 

“ How long do you think ? ” 

“ If I could choose, I should say a minute,” replied Eu- 
gene, “for the Jolly Fellowship Porters are not the jolliest 
dogs I have known. But I suppose we are best here until 
they turn us out with the other suspicious characters, at 
midnight.” 

Thereupon he stirred the fire, and sat down on one side of 
it. It struck eleven, and he made believe to compose him- 
self patiently. But gradually he took the fidgets in one leg, 
and then in the other leg, and then in one arm, and then in 
the other arm, and then in his chin, and then in his back, and 
then in his forehead, and then in his hair, and then in his 
nose; and then he stretched himself recumbent on two 
chairs, and groaned ; and then he started up. 

“Invisible insects of diabolical activity swarm in this 
place. I am tickled and twitched all over. Mentally, I 
have now committed a burglary under the meanest circum- 
stances, and the myrmidons of justice are at my heels.” 

“I am quite as bad,” said Lightwood, sitting up facing 
him, with a tumbled head, after going through some won- 
derful evolutions, in which his head had been the lowest 
part of him. “ This restlessness began with me long ago. 
All the time you were out I felt like Gulliver with the Lilli- 
putians firing upon him.” 


76 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ It won’t do, Mortimer. We must get into the air ; we 
must join our dear friend and brother, Riderhood. And let 
us tranquilize ourselves by making a compact. Next time 
(with a view to our peace of mind) we’ll commit the crime, 
instead of taking the criminal. Y ou swear it ? ” 

“ Certainly.” 

Sworn ! Let Tippins look to it. Her life’s in danger. 
Come to our honest friend.” 

He led him to the post of watch, and they both dropped 
down and crept under the lee of the boat ; a better shelter 
than it had seemed before, being directly contrasted with 
the blowing wind and the bare night. 

Mr. Inspector at home ?. ” whispered Eugene. 

“ Here I am, sir.” 

“ And our friend of the perspiring brow is at the far corner 
there ? Grood. Anything happened ? ” 

His daughter has been out, thinking she heard him call- 
ing, unless it was a sign to him to keep out of the way. It 
might have been.” 

“ It might have been Rule Britannia,” muttered Eugene, 
“ but it wasn’t. Mortimer.” 

Here ! ” (On the other side of Mr. Inspector.) 

Two burglaries now, and a forgery ! ” 

Bells to windward told them of its being One — Two — 
Three. As the time passed, this slinking business became a 
more and more precarious one. It would seem as if the man 
had had some intimation of what was in hand against him, or 
had taken fright ! His movements might have been planned 
to gain for him, in getting beyond their reach, twelve hours’ 
advantage The honest man who had expended the sweat 
of his brow became uneasy, and began to complain with bit- 
terness of the proneness of mankind to cheat him — him in- 
vested with the dignity of Labor ! 

Their retreat was so chosen that while they could watch 
the river, they could watch the house. No one had passed 
in or out, since the daughter thought she heard the father 
calling. No one could pass in or out without being seen. 

“ But it will be light at five,” said Mr. Inspector, “and 
then shall be seen.” 

“ Look here,” said Riderhood, “ what do you say to this ? 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


77 


He may have been lurking in and out, and just holding his 
own betwixt two or three bridges, for hours back. My 
boat’s among them boats here at the cause’ ay. I’ll put off in 
her and take a look around. I know his ways, and the like- 
ly nooks he favors.” 

Eugene had raised himself on his elbow to look into the 
darkness after him. I wish the boat of my honorable and 
gallant friend,” he murmured, lying down again and speak- 
ing into his hat, ‘‘may be endowed with philanthropy 
enough to turn bottom-upward and extinguish him ! — Mor- 
timer.” 

“ My honorable friend.” 

“ Three burglaries, two forgeries, and a midnight assassi- 
nation.” 

More than an hour had passed, and they were even doz- 
ing, when one of them — each said it was he, and he had not 
dozed — made out Riderhood in his boat at the spot agreed 
on. They sprang up, came out from their shelter, and went 
down to him. When.he saw them coming he dropped along- 
side the causew^ay ; so that they, standing on the causeway, 
could speak wdth him in whispers, under the shadowy mass 
of the Six Jolly Fellowship-Porters fast asleep. 

“ Blest if I can make it out ! ” said he, staring at them. 

“ Make what out ? Have you seen him ? ” 

“No.” 

“ What have you seen ? ” asked Lightwood. For he was 
staring at them in the strangest way. 

“ I’ve seen his boat.” 

“Not empty?” 

“Yes, empty. And what’s more, — adrift. And what’s 
more, — with one scull gone. And what’s more, — with 
t’other scull jammed in the thowels and broke short off. 
And what’s more — the boat’s drove tight by the tide, ’atwixt 
two tiers of barges. And what’s more, — he’s in luck again, 
by George if he ain’t I ” 

CHAPTER XIY. 

A S if with one accord, they all turned their eyes towards 
the light of the fire shining through the window. It 


78 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


was fainter and duller. Perhaps fire, like the higher animal 
and vegetable life it helps to sustain, has its greatest tenden- 
cy towards death when the night is dying and the day is not 
yet born. 

“ If it was me that had the law of this here job in hand,” 
growled Riderhood, with a threatening shake of his head, 

“ blest if I wouldn’t lay hold of Aer, at any rate ! ” 

“ Ay, but it is not you,” said Eugene, with something so 
suddenly fierce in him that the informer returned submis- 
sively : “ Well, well, well, T’other Grovernor, I didn’t say it 
was. A man may speak.” 

And vermin may be silent,” said Eugene. “ Hold your 
tongue, you water-rat ! ” 

Astonished by his friend’s unusual heat, Lightwood stared 
too, and then said : What can have become of this man ? ” 

“ Can’t imagine. Unless he dived overboard.” The in- 
former wiped his brow ruefully as he said it, sitting in his 
boat and always staring disconsolate. 

“ Did you make his boat fast ? ” 

“ She’s fast enough till the tide runs back. I couldn’t 
make her faster than she is. Come aboard of mine, and see ' 
for your own selves.” 

“ Hallo ! Steady ! ” cried Eugene, as they bumped heavily 
against a pile ; and then in a lower voice (“ I wish the boat of 
my honorable and gallant friend may be endowed with phil- 
anthropy enough not to turn bottom-upward and extinguish 
us!) Steady, steady! Sit close, Mortimer. Here’s the 
hail again. See how it flies, like a troop of wild cats, at Mr. 
Riderhood’s eyes ! ” 

They glided slowly on, keeping under the shore and sneak- 
ing in and out among the shipping by back-alleys of water, 
for a half-hour, when Riderhood unshipped his sculls, stood 
holding on to a barge, and hand over hand longwise along 
the barge’s side, gradually worked his boat under her head 
into a secret little nook of scummy water. Driven into that 
nook, wedged as he had described, was Gaffer’s boat ; that 
boat with the stain still in it, bearing some resemblance to a 
muffled human form. 

“This is Hexam’s boat,” said Mr. Inspector. “I know 
her well.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


79 


“ And see now ! ” added Riderhood, creeping aft, and 
showing a stretched rope made fast there and towing over- 
board. Didn’t I tell you he was in luck again ? ” 

“ Haul in,” said Mr. Inspector. 

“Easy to say haul in,” answered Riderhood. “Not so 
easy done. His luck’s got fouled under the keels of the 
barges. I tried to haul in last time, but I couldn’t. See how 
taut the line is ? ” 

“ I must have it up,” said Mr. Inspector. 

After certain minutes, and a few directions to the rest to 
“ ease her a little for’ard,” and “ now ease her a trifle aft,” 
and the like, he said composedly, “ All clear ! ” and the line 
and the boat came free together. 

“Now,” said Mr. Inspector again to Riderhood, when 
they were all on the slushy stones ; “ you have had more 
practice in this than I have had, and ought to be better at 
it. Undo the tow-rope, and we’ll help you haul in.” 

Riderhood got into the boat accordingly. It appeared as 
if he had scarcely had a moment’s time to touch the rope or 
look over the stern, when he came scrambling back, as pale 
as the morning, and gasped out : 

“ By the Lord, he’s done me ! ” 

“ What do you mean ? ” they all demanded. 

He pointed behind him at the boat, and gasped to that de- 
gree that he dropped upon the stones to get his breath. 

“ Gaffer’s done me. It’s Gaffer ! ” 

They ran to the rope, leaving him gasping there. Soon, 
the form of the bird of prey, dead some hours, lay stretched 
upon the shore, with a new blast storming at it and clotting 
the wet hair with hailstones. 

“ Now see,” said Mr. Inspector, after mature deliberation, 
kneeling on one knee beside the body, “ see how it works 
round upon him. It‘s a wild tempestuous evening when 
this man that was,” stooping to wipe some hailstones out of 
his hair with an end of his own drowned jacket, “ — there ! 
Now he’s more like himself, though he’s badly bruised — 
when this man that was, rows out upon the river on his usual 
lay. He carries with him this coil of rope. He was a light- 
dresser was this man, you see ? — and when it was wet or 
freezing, or blew cold, he would hang this coil of line round 


80 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


iiis .neck. Last evening he does this. W orse for him ! He 
•dodges about in his boat, does this man, till he gets chilled. 
His hands,” taking up one of them, which dropped like a 
leaden weight, “ get numbed. He sees some object that’s in 
his way of business, floating. He makes ready to secure 
that object. He unwinds the end of his coil that he wants 
to take some turns on in his boat, and he takes turns enough 
on it to secure that it shan’t run out. He makes it too se- 
cure, as it happens. His object drifts up, before he is quite 
ready for it. He catches at it, thinks he’ll make sure of the 
contents of the pockets anyhow, bends right over the stern, 
and in one of these heavy squalls, or in the cross-swell of two 
steamers, or in not being quite prepared, or through all or 
most or some, gets a lurch, overbalances and goes headfore- 
most overboard. How see! He can swim, can this man, 
and instantly he strikes out. But in such striking-out he 
tangles his arms, pulls strong on the slip-knot, and it runs 
home. The object he had expected to take in tow, floats by, 
and his own boat tows him dead, to where we found him, all 
entangled in his own line. Y ou’ll ask me how I make it out 
about the pockets ? First, I’ll tell you more ; there was sil- 
ver in ’em. How do I make that out ? Simple and satis- 
factory. Because he’s got it here.” The lecturer held up 
the tightly clenched right hand. 

What is to be done with the remains ? ” asked Light- 
wood. 

“ If you wouldn’t object to standing by him hah a minute, 
sir,” was the reply, “ I’ll find the nearest of our men to come 
and take charge of him.” 

“ Eugene,” said Lightwood — and was about to add, “ we 
may wait at a little distance,” when turning his head he 
found that no Eugene was there. He raised his voice and 
called “ Eugene I Holloa I ” But no Eugene replied. 

It was broad daylight now, and he looked about. But no 
Eugene was in all the view. 

Mr. Inspector speedily returning down the wooden stairs, 
with a police constable, Lightwood asked him if he had seen 
his friend leave them ? Mr. Inspector could not exactly say 
that he had seen him go, but had noticed that he was restless. 

“ Singular and entertaining combination, sir, your friend.” 


GUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


81 


“ I wish it had not been a part of his singular and enter- 
taining combination to give me the slip under these dreary 
circumstances at this time of the morning,” said Lightwood. 
“ Can we get anything hot to drink ? ” 

W e could, and we did, in a public-house kitchen. 

As Mortimer Lightwood sat before the blazing fire, con- 
scious of drinking brandy and water then and there in his 
sleep, and yet at one and the same time drinking burnt sher- 
ry at the Six Jolly Fellowships, and lying under the boat on 
the river shore, and sitting in the boat that Riderhood 
rowed, and having to dine in the Temple with an unknown 
man, who described himself as M. R. F. Eugene G-affer Har- 
mon, and said he lived at Hailstorm, — as he passed through 
these curious vicissitudes of fatigue and slumber, arranged 
upon a scale of a dozen hours to the second, he became 
aware of hearing, in a mist through which Mr. Inspector 
loomed vague and large, that that officer took upon himself 
to prepare the dead man’s daughter for what had befallen in 
the night, and generally that he took everything upon him- 
self, and he, Lightwood, stumbled in his sleep to a cabstand, 
called a cab, and had entered the army and committed a cap- 
ital military offense and been tried by court-martial and 
found guilty and had arranged his affairs and been marched 
out to be shot, before his door banged. 

The night’s work had so exhausted and worn out this ac- 
tor in it, that he had become a mere somnambulist. He was 
too tired to rest in his sleep, until he w^as even tired out of 
being too tired, and dropped into oblivion. Late in the af- 
ternoon he awoke, and in some anxiety sent round to Eu- 
gene’s lodging hard by, to inquire if he were up yet ? 

Oh yes, he was up. In fact, he had not been to bed. He 
had just come home. And here he was, close following on 
the heels of the message. 

“ Why, what bloodshot, draggled, disheveled spectacle is 
this ! ” cried Mortimer. 

“ Are my feathers so very much rumpled ? ” said Eugene, 
coolly going up to the looking-glass. “ They are rather out 
of sorts. But consider. Such a night for plumage ! ” 

“ Such a night ! ” repeated Mortimer. What became of 
you in the morning ? ” 

6 


82 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ dear fellow,” said Eugene, sitting on his bed, “ I felt 
that we had bored one another so long, that an unbroken 
continuance of those relations must inevitably terminate in 
our flying to opposite points of the earth. I also felt that I 
had committed every crime in the Newgate Calendar. So, 
for mingled considerations of friendship and felony, I took a 


walk.” 


CHAPTER XV. 


R. AND MRS. BOFFIN sat after breakfast, in the 



m Bower, a prey to prosperity. Mr. Boffin’s face de- 
noted care and complication. Many disordered papers were 
before him, and he looked at them about as hopefully as an 
innocent civilian might look at a crowd of troops whom he 
was required at five minutes’ notice to manoeuvre and re- 


view. 


Mr. Bofiin was in such severe literary difficulties that his 
eyes were prominent and fixed, and his breathing was ster- 
torous, when, to the great relief of Mrs Boffin, who observ- 
ed these symptoms with alarm, the yard bell rang. 

The hammer-headed young man announced “ Mr. Roke- 
smith.” 

“ Oh ! ” said Mr. Boffin. “ Oh indeed ! Our and the Wil- 
fers’ Mutual Friend, my dear. Ask him to come in.” 

Mr. Rokesmith appeared. 

“ Sit down, sir,” said Mr. Boffin, shaking hands with him. 
‘‘Mrs. Boffin you’re already acquainted with. Well, sir, I 
am rather unprepared to see you, for, to tell you the truth, 
I’ve been so busy with one thing and another, that I’ve not 
had time to turn your offer over.” 

“ That’s apology for both of us : for Mr. Boffin, and for me 
as well,” said the smiling Mrs. Boffin. “ But Lor’ ! we can 
talk it over now ; can’t us ? ” 

Mr. Rokesmith bowed, thanked her, and said he hoped so. 

“ Let me see then,” resumed Mr. Boffin, with his hand to 
his chin. “ It was Secretary that you named ; wasn’t it ? ” 

“ I said Secretary,” assented Mr. Rokesmith. 

“ It rather puzzled me at the time,” said Mr. Boffin, “ and 
it rather puzzled me and Mrs. Boffin when we spoke of it af- 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


83 


terwards, because (not to make a mystery of our belief) we 
have always believed a Secretary to be a piece of furniture, 
mostly of mahogany, lined with green baize or leather, with 
a lot of little drawers in it. IsT ow, you won’t think that I take 
a liberty when I mention that you certainly ain’t thaV^ 

Certainly not,” said Mr. Rokesmith. But he had used 
the word in the sense of Steward. 

“ Why, as to Steward, you see,” returned Mr. Boffin, with 
his hand still to his chin, the odds are that Mrs. Boffin and 
me may never go upon the water. Being both bad sailors, 
we should want a Steward if we did ; but there’s generally 
one provided.” 

Mr. Rokesmith again explained ; defining the duties he 
sought to undertake, as those of general superintendent, or 
manager, or over-looker, or man of business. 

“Now, for instance — come!” said Mr. Boffin, in his 
pouncing way. “If you entered my employment what 
would you do? ” 

“ I would keep exact accounts of all the expenditure jmu 
sanctioned, Mr. Boffin. I would write your letters, under 
your directioUvS. I would transact your business with peo- 
ple in your pay or employment. I would,” with a glance 
and a half-smile at the table, “ arrange your papers — ” 

Mr. Boffin rubbed his inky ear and looked at his wife. 

“ I tell you what,” said Mr. Boffin, slowty crumpling his 
own blotted note in his hand; “if you’ll turn to at these 
present papers, and see what you can make of ’em, I shall 
know better what I can make of you.” 

No sooner said than done. 

“Apple-pie order!” said Mr. Boffin. “And whatever 
you do with your ink, I can’t think, for you’re as clean as a 
whistle after it. Now, as to a letter. Let’s,” said Mr. Bof- 
fin, rubbing his hands in his pleasantly childish admiration, 
“ let’s try a letter next.” 

“ To whom shall it be addressed, Mr. Boffin ? ” 

“Anyone. Yourself.” 

Mr. Rokesmith quickly wrote, and then read aloud : 

“Mr. Boffin presents his compliments to Mr. John Roke- 
smith, and begs to say that he has decided on giving Mr. John 
Rokesmith a trial in the capacity he desires to fill. Mr. Bof- 


84 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


fin takes Mr. John Rokesmith at his word, in postponing to 
some indefinite period, the consideration of salary. It is 
quite understood that Mr. Boffin is in no way committed on 
that point. Mr. Boffin has merely to add, that he relies on 
Mr. John Rokesmith’ s assurance that he will be faithful and 
serviceable. Mr. J ohn Rokesmith will please enter on his 
duties immediately.” 

“Well ! Now, Noddy ! ” cried Mrs. Boffin, clapping her 
hands, “ That is a good one ! ” 

Mr. Boffin was no less delighted ; indeed, in his own bo- 
som, he regarded both the composition itself and the device 
that had given birth to it, as a very remarkable monument of 
human ingenuity. 

“ And I tell you, my deary,” said Mrs. Boffin, “ that if you 
don’t close with Mr. Rokesmith now at once, and if you ever 
go a muddling yourself again with things never meant nor 
made for you, you’ll have an apoplexy — besides iron-mould- 
ing your linen — and you’ll break my heart.” 

Mr. Boffin embraced his spouse for these words of wis- 
dom, and then, congratulating J ohn Rokesmith on the brill- 
iancy of his achievements, gave him his hand in pledge of 
their new relations. So did Mrs. Boffin. 

“ Now,” said Mr. Boffin, “ you must be let a little more in- 
to our affairs, Rokesmith. I mentioned to you, when I 
made your acquaintance, or I might better say when you 
made mine, that Mrs. Boffin’s inclinations was setting in the 
way of Fashion, but that I didn’t know how fashionable we 
might or might not grow. W ell ! Mrs. Boffin has carried the 
day, and w'e’re going in neck and crop for Fashion. The 
fact is, my literary man named to me that a house with 
which he is, as I may say, connected, had a board up, ‘ This 
Eminently Aristocratic Mansion to be.let or sold.’ Me and 
Mrs. Boffin wmnt to look at it, and finding it beyond a doubt 
Eminently Aristocratic (though a trifle high and dull, which 
after all may be part of the same thing) took it. Rokesmith, 
what shall we say about your living in the house ? ” 

“ In this house ? ” 

“No, no. I have got other plans for this house. In the 
new house ? ” 

“ That will be as you please, Mr. Boffin. I hold myself 
quite at your disposal. Y ou know where I live at present.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


85 


“Weill” said Mr. Boffin, after considering the point; 
“ suppose you keep as you are for the present, and we’ll de- 
cide by-and-by. You’ll begin to take charge at once of all 
that’s going on in the new house, will you ? ” 

“ Most willingly. I will begin this very day. Will you 
give me the address ? ” 

Mr. Boffin repeated it, and the Secretary wrote it down in 
his pocket-book. Mrs. Boffin took the opportunity of his 
being so engaged, to get a better observation of his face than 
she had yet taken. It impressed her in his favor, for she 
nodded aside to Mr. Boffin, “ I like him.” 

“ I will see directly that everything is in train, Mr. Boffin,” 
said the Secretary ; and so withdrew. 

“Now,” said Mr. Boffin to himself, subsiding into his reg- 
ular series of turns in the yard, “ if I can make it comfortable 
with Wegg, my affairs will be going smooth,” 

The man of low cunning had, of course, acquired a mas- 
tery over the man of high simplicity. The mean man had, of 
course, got the better of the generous man. 

For these reasons Mr. Boffin passed but anxious hours un- 
til evening came, and with it Mr. Wegg, stumping leisurely 
to the Roman Empire. At about this period Mr. Boffin had 
become profoundly interested in the fortunes of a great mil- 
itary leader known to him as Bully Sawyers, but perhaps 
better known to fame and easier of identification by the 
classical student under the less Britannic name of Belisarius. 
Even this general’s career paled in interest for Mr. Boffin be- 
fore the clearing of his conscience with Wegg; and hence, 
when that literary gentleman Had according to custom eaten 
and drunk until he was all a-glow, and when he took up his 
book with the usual introduction, “ And now, Mr. Boffin, 
sir, we’ll decline and we’ll fall! ” Mr. Boffin stopped him. 

“You remember, Wegg, when I first told you that I 
wanted to make a sort of offer to you ? I have got another 
offer to make you, and I hope you’ll like it.” 

“ Thank you, sir,” returned that reticent individual. “ I 
hope it may prove so.” 

“ What do you think,” said Mr. Boffin, “ of not keeping a 
stall, Wegg?” 

“I think, sir,” replied Wegg, “that I should like to be 
shown the gentleman prepared to make it worth my while ! ” 


86 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Here he is,” said Mr. Boffin. 

Mr. Wegg was going to say, My Benefactor, and had said 
My Bene, when a grandiloquent change came over him. 

‘‘Ho, Mr. Boffin, not you, sir. Anybody but you. Do 
not fear, Mr. Boffim, that I shall contaminate the premises 
which your gold has bought, with my lowly pursuits. I am 
aware, sir, that it would not become me to carry on my little 
traffic under the windows of your mansion. I have already 
thought of that, and taken my measures. Ho need to be 
bougdit out, sir. Would Stepney Fields be considered intru- 
sive? If not remote enough, I can go remoter. In the 
words of the poet’s song, which I do not quite remember : 

Thrown on the wide world, doom’d to wander and roam. 

Bereft of my parents, bereft of a home, 

A stranger to something and what’s his name joy, 

Behold little Edmund the poor Peasant boy. 

— And equally,” said he, repairing the want of direct appli- 
cation in the last line, “ behold myself on a similar footing ! ” 

“ How, W egg, Wegg, Wegg,” remonstrated the excellent 
Boffin. “ Y on are too sensitive. Hear me out, Wegg. Y on 
have taken it into your head that I mean to pension you off.” 

“ True, sir,” returned Wegg. 

“ But 1 mean it.” 

The assurance seemed hardly as comforting to Mr. Wegg, 
as Mr. Boffin intended it to be. Indeed, an appreciable elon- 
gation of his visage might have been observed as he replied : 

“ Don’t you indeed, sir ? ” 

“ Ho,” pursued Mr. Boffin ; “ because that would express, 
as I understand it, that you were not going to do anything to 
deserve your money. But you are; you are.” 

“That, sir,” replied Mr. Wegg, cheering up bravely, “is 
quite another pair of shoes. How my independence as a 
man is again elevated. How I no longer 

Weep for the hour, 

When to Boffinses bower. 

The Lord of the valley with offers came ; 

' Neither does the moon hide her light 

From the heavens to-night. 

And weep behind her clouds o’er any individual in the present 
Company’s shame. 

— Please to proceed, Mr. Boffin.” 


OUE MUTUAL FEIEND, 


87 


Tliank’ee, Wegg, both for your confidence in me and for 
your frequent dropping into poetry; both of which is 
friendly. W ell, then ; my idea is, that you should give up 
your stall, and that I should put you into the Bower here, to 
keep it for us. It’s a pleasant spot ; and a man with coals 
and candles and a pound a week might be in clover here.” 

Hem ! W ould that man, sir — we will say that man, for 
the purposes of argueyment — be expected to throw any 
other capacity in, or wmuld any other capacity be considered 
extra? JSTow let us suppose that man to be engaged as a 
reader : say in the evening. Would that man’s pay as a 
reader in the evening, be added to the other amount, which, 
adopting your language, we will call clover; or would it 
emerge into that amount, or clover ? ” 

“ Well,” said Mr. Boffin, “ I suppose it would be added.” 

“ I suppose it would, sir. Y ou are right, sir. Exactly my 
own views, Mr. Boffin.” Here MYgg rose, and balancing 
himself on his wmoden leg, fluttered over his prey with ex- 
tended hand. “ Mr. Boffin, consider it done. Say no more, 
sir, not a word more. My stall and I are forever parted. 

Then farewell my trim-built wherry, 

Oars and coat and badge farewell ! 

Never more at Chelsea Ferry, 

Shall your Thomas take a spell ! ” 


Mr. Wegg resumed his spectacles therefore. But Saw- 
yers was not to be of the party that night ; for, before Wegg 
had found his place, Mrs. Boffin’s tread was heard upon the 
stairs, so unusually heavy and hurried, that Mr. Boffin would 
have started up at the sound, anticipating some occurrence 
much out of the common course, even though she had not al- 
so called to him in an agitated tone. 

Mr. Boffin hurried out, and found her on the dark stair- 
case, panting, with a lighted candle in her hand. 

“ What’s the matter, my dear ? ” 

don’t know; I don’t know; but I wish you’d come up- 
stairs.” 

^ Much surprised, Mr. Boffin went up-stairs and accompa- 
nied Mrs. Boffin into their own room. ' 

What is it, my dear ? Why, you’re frightened ! You 
frightened ? ” 


88 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ I am not one of that sort, certainly,” said Mrs. Boffin, as 
she sat down in a chair to recover herself, and took her hus- 
band’s arm ; “ but it’s very strange ! ” 

“ What is, my dear ? ” 

“Noddy, the faces of the old man and the two children 
are all over the house to-night.” 

“ My dear ? ” exclaimed Mr. Boffin. But not without a 
certain uncomfortable sensation gliding down his back. 

“ I know it must sound foolish, and yet it is so.” 

“ Where did you think you saw them ? ” 

“ I don’t know that I think I saw them anywhere. I felt 
them.” 

“ Touched them ? ” 

“ No. Felt them in the air. I was sorting those things 
on the chest, and not thinking of the old man or the children, 
but singing to myself, when all in a moment I felt there was 
a face growing out of the dark. For a moment it was the 
old man’s, and then it got younger. For a moment it was 
both the children’s, and then it got older. For a moment it 
was a strange face, and then it was all the faces. I thought 
I’d try another room, and shake it off. I says to myself, ‘ I’ll 
go and walk sloAvly up and down the old man’s room three 
times, from end to end, and then I shall have conquered it.’ 
I went in with the candle in my hand ; but the moment I 
came near the bed, the air got thick with them.” 

“With the faces?” 

“Yes, and I even felt they were in the dark behind the 
side-door, and on the little staircase, floating away into the 
yard. Then I called you.” 

Mr. Boffin, lost in amazement, looked at Mrs. Boffin. 
Mrs. Boffin, lost in her own fluttered inability to make this 
out, looked at Mr. Boffin. 

“I think, my dear,” said the Grolden Dustman, “I’ll at 
once get rid of Wegg for the night, because he’s coming to 
inhabit the Bower, and it might be put into his head, or 
somebody else’s, if he heard this and it got about, that 
the house is haunted. W^hereas we know better. Don’t 
we?” 

“ I never had the feeling in the house before,” said Mrs. 
Boffin. 


OUR MUTUAL FBIEIW. 


89 


CHAPTER XYI. 

T he Secretary lost no time in getting to work, and his 
vigilance and method soon set their mark on the Gold- 
en Dustman’s affairs. 

As on the Secretary’s face there was a nameless cloud, so 
on his manner there was a shadow equally indefinable. It 
was not that he was embarrassed, as on that first night with 
the Wilfer family; he was habitually unembarrassed now, 
and yet the something remained. It was not that his man- 
ner was bad, as on that occasion ; it was now very good, as 
being modest, gracious, and ready. 

He established a temporary office for himself in the new 
house, and all went on well under his hand, with one singu- 
lar exception. He manifestly objected to communicate 
with Mr. Boffin’s solicitor. Two or three times, when there 
was some slight occasion for his doing so, he transferred the 
task to Mr. Boffin. 

Among his first occupations the pursuit of that orphan 
wanted by Mrs. Boffin held a conspicuous place. 

At length, tidings were received by the Reverend Frank 
Milvey of a charming orphan to be found at Brentford. 

The Secretary proposed to Mrs. Boffin to drive her down, 
that she might at once form her own opinion. 

The abode of Mrs. Betty Higden was not easy to find, but 
after many inquiries and defeats, there was pointed out to 
them in a lane, a very small cottage residence, with a board 
across the open doorway, hooked on to which board by the 
armpits was a young gentleman of tender years, angling 
for mud with a headless wooden horse and line. In this 
young sportsman, distinguished by a crisply curling auburn 
head and a bluff countenance, the Secretary descried the 
orphan. 

It was a small home with a large mangle in it, at the han- 
dle of which machine stood a very long boy, with a very lit- 
tle head, and an open mouth of disproportionate capacity 
that seemed to assist his eyes in staring at the visitors. In a 
corner below the mangle, on a couple of stools, sat two very 
little children ; a boy and a girl ; and when the very long 
boy, in an interval of staring, took a turn at the mangle, it 


90 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


was alarming to see how it lunged itself at those two inno- 
cents, like a catapult designed for their destruction, harm- 
lessly retiring when within an inch of their heads. The 
room was clean and neat, but it was easy to see that its oc- 
cupant was poor. 

She was one of those old women, was Mrs. Betty Higden, 
who by dint of an indomitable purpose and a strong consti- 
tution fight out many years, though each year has come 
with its new knock-down blows fresh to the fight against 
her, wearied by it ; an active old woman, with a bright dark 
eye and a resolute face, yet quite a tender creature too ; not 
a logically-reasoning woman, but God is good, and hearts 
may count in Heaven as high as heads. 

Yes sure ! ” said she, when the business was opened, 
“ Mrs. Milvey had the kindness to write to me, ma’am, and 
I got Sloppy to read it. It was a pretty letter. But she’s 
an affable lady.” 

The visitors glanced at the long boy, who seemed to indi- 
cate by a broader stare of his mouth and eyes that in him 
Sloppy stood confessed. 

‘‘ For I ain’t, you must know,” said Betty, “ much of a 
hand at reading writing-hand, though I can read my Bible 
and most print. And I do love a newspaper. Y ou mightn’t 
think it, but Sloppy is a beautiful reader of a newspaper. 
He do the Police in different voices.” 

Is that the dear child in your lap ? ” said Mrs. Boffin. 

“ Yes, ma’am, this is J ohnny.” 

“Johnny, too ! ” cried Mrs. Boffin, turning to the Secre- 
tary ; “ already J ohnny ! Only one of the two names left 
to give him! He’s a pretty boy.” 

“ Yes, ma’am, he’s a pretty boy, he’s a dear darhng boy, 
he’s the child of my own last left daughter’s daughter. But 
she’s gone the way of all the rest.” 

“ Those are not his brother and sister ? ” said Mrs. Boffin. 

“ Oh, dear no, ma’am. Those are Minders.” 

“ Minders ? ” the Secretary repeated. 

“ Left to be Minded, sir. I keep a Minding-school. I 
can take only three, on account of the Mangle. But I love 
children, and Four-pence a week is Four-pence. Come 
here, Toddles and Poddies.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


91 


Toddles was the pet-name of the boj ; Poddies of the 
girl. 

“ And Master — or Mister — Sloppy ? ” said the Secretary, 
in doubt whether he was man, boy, or what. 

love-child,” returned Betty Higden, dropping her 
voice ; “ parents never known ; found in the street. He 
was brought up in the — ” with a shiver of repugnance, 
“ — the Hous6.” 

The Poor-house ? ” said the Secretary. 

Mrs. Higden set that resolute old face of hers, and darkly 
nodded yes. 

‘‘ You dislike the mention of it.” 

‘‘ Dislike the mention of it ? Kill me sooner than take me 
there. Throw this pretty child under cart-horses’ feet and 
a loaded wagon, sooner than take him there. Come to us 
and find us all a-dying, and set a light to us all where we lie, 
and let us all blaze away with the house into a heap of cin- 
ders, sooner than move a corpse of us there ! ” 

And does he work for you ? ” asked the Secretary, gen- 
tly bringing the discourse back to Master or Mister Sloppy. 

“ Yes,” said Betty with a good-humored smile and nod of 
the head. ‘‘ And well too.” 

“ Does he live here ? ” 

“ More here than anywhere. He was thought to be no 
better than a Natural, and first come to me as a Minder.” 

“ Is he called by his right name ? ” 

‘‘ Why you see, speaking quite correctly, he has no right 
name. I always understood he took his name from being 
found on a Sloppy night.” 

He seems an amiable fellow.” 

“ Bless you, sir, there’s not a bit of him,” returned Betty, 
“ that’s not amiable. So you may judge how amiable he is, 
by running your eye along his heighth.” 

Of an ungainly make was Sloppy. Too much of him long- 
wise, too little of him broadwise, and too many sharp angles 
of him angle-wise. One of those shambling male human 
creatures, born to be indiscreetly candid in the revelation of 
buttons ; every button he had about him glaring at the pub- 
lic to a quite preternatural extent. A considerable capital 
of knee and elbow and wrist and ankle, had Sloppy, and he 


92 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


didn’t know how to dispose of it to the best advantage, but 
was always investing it in wrong securities, and so getting 
himself into embarrassed circumstances. Full-Private 
Number One in the Awkward Squad of the rank and file of 
life, was Sloppy, and yet had his glimmering notions of 
standing true to the Colors. 

“ And now,” said Mrs. Boffin, “ concerning Johnny. If 
you trust the dear child to me, he shall have the best of 
homes, the best of care, the best of education, the best of 
friends. Please Gfod, I will be a true good mother to him ! ” 
I am thankful to you, ma’am, and the dear chilckwould 
be thankful if he was old enough to understand. I wouldn’t 
stand in the dear child’s light, not if I had all my life before 
me instead of a very little of it. But I hope you won’t take 
it ill that I cleave to the child closer than words can teU, for 
he’s the last living thing left me. I have seen so many of 
them on my lap. And they are all gone but this one ! I am 
ashamed to seem so selfish, but I don’t really mean it. It’ll 
be the making of his fortune, and he’ll be a gentleman when 
I am dead. I — I — don’t know what comes over me. I — 
try against it. Don’t notice me ! ” The resolute mouth 
gave way, and the fine strong old face broke up into weak- 
ness and tears. 

“ There, there, there ! ” said Mrs. Boffin, almost regarding 
her kind self as the most ruthless of women. Nothing is 
going to be done. Nobody need be frightened. We’re all 
comfortable ; ain’t we, Mrs. Higden ? ” 

“ Sure and certain we are,” returned Betty. 

“ And there really is no hurry, you know,” said Mrs. Bof- 
fin in a lower voice. “ Take time to think of it, my good 
creature ! ” 

“Don’t you fear me no more, ma’am,” said Betty; “I 
thought of it for good yesterday. I don’t know what come 
over me just now, but it’ll never come again.” 

“ Well, then, Johnny shall have more time to think of it,” 
returned Mrs. Boffin; “and perhaps you wouldn’t mind let- 
ting me know how used to it you begin to get, and how it all 
goes on ? ” 

“ I’ll send Sloppy,” said Mrs. Higden. 

So the interview was considered very successful, and Mrs. 
Boffin was pleased,* and all were satisfied. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


93 


This piece of business thus put in train, the Secretary 
drove Mrs. Boffin back to the Bower, and found employment 
for himself at the new house until evening. Whether, when 
evening came, he took a way to his lodgings that led through 
fields, with any design of finding Miss Bella Wilfer in those 
fields, is not so certain as that she regularly walked there at 
that hour. 

And, moreover, it is certain that there she was. 

hTo longer in mourning. Miss Bella was dressed in as pret- 
ty colors as she could muster. There is no denying that she 
was as pretty as they, and that she and the colors went very 
prettily together. She was reading as she walked, and of 
course it is to be inferred, from her showing no knowledge of 
Mr. Rokesmith’s approach, that she did not know he was ap- 
proaching. 

“ Eh ? ” said Miss Bella, raising her eyes from her book, 
when he stopped before her. “ Oh ! It’s you.” 

Only I. A fine evening ! ” 

Is it ? ” said Bella, looking coldly around. I suppose it 
is, now you mention it. I have not been thinking of the 
evening.” 

“ So intent upon your book ? ” 

“ Ye-e-es,” replied Bella, with a drawl of indifference. 

A love story. Miss Wilfer ? ” 

“ Oh dear no, or I shouldn’t be reading it. It’s more about 
money than anything else.” 

“ And does it say that money is better than anything ? ” 

“ Upon my word,” returned Bella, “ I forget what it says, 
but you can find out for yourself, if you like, Mr. Rokesmith. 
I don’t want it any more.” 

The Secretary took the book — she had fluttered the leaves 
as if it were a fan — and walked beside her. 

I am charged with a message for you. Miss Wilfer, from 
Mrs. Boffin. She desired me to assure you of the pleasure 
she has in finding that she will be ready to receive you in an- 
other week or two at furthest.” 

Bella turned her head towards him, with her prettily inso- 
lent eyebrows raised, and her eyelids drooping. As much 
as to say, “ How did you come by the message, pray ? ” 

“ I have been waiting for an opportunity of telling you 
that I am Mr. Boffin’s Secretary.” 


94 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“Then are you going to be always there, Mr. Roke- 
smith? ” she inquired. 

“Always? No. Very much there ? Yes.” 

“ Dear me I ” drawled Bella. 

“ But my position there as Secretary, will be very differ- 
ent from yours as guest. You will know little or nothing 
about me. I shall transact the business ; you will transact 
the pleasure.” 

As he watched her with a covert look, he saw a certain 
ambitious triumph in her face, which no assumed coldness 
could conceal. 

And now, in the blooming summer days, behold Mr. and 
Mrs. Boffin established in the eminently aristocratic family 
mansion, and behold all manner of crawling, creeping, flut- 
tering, and buzzing creatures, attracted by the gold dust of 
the Golden Dustman ! 

Miss Bella Wilfer becomes an inmate, for an indefinite 
period, of the eminently aristocratic dwelling. 

But the old house. There are no designs against the 
Golden Dustman there ? There are no fish of the shark tribe 
in the Bower waters ? Perhaps not. Still, Wegg is estab- 
lished there, and would seem, judged by his secret proceed- 
ings, to cherish a notion of making a discovery. For when 
a man with a wooden leg lies prone on his stomach to peep 
under bedsteads; and hops up ladders, like some extinct 
bird, to survey the tops of presses and cupboards ; and pro- 
vides himself an iron rod which he is always poking and 
prodding into dust-mounds ; the probability is that he ex- 
pects to find something. 

CHAPTER XYII. 

44 O 0 you want to go and see your sister, Hexam ? ” 
lO “If you please, Mr. Headstone.” 

“ I have haK a mind to go with you. Where does your 
sister live ? ” 

“ Why, she is not settled yet, Mr. Headstone. I’d rather 
you didn’t see her till she is settled, if it was all the same to 
you.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


95 


“ Look here, Hexam.” Mr. Bradley Headstone, highly 
certificated stipendiary schoolmaster, drew his right fore- 
finger through one of the buttonholes of the boy’s coat, and 
looked at it attentively. “ I hope your sister may be good 
company for you ? ” 

Why do you doubt it, Mr. Headstone ? ” 

“ I did not say I doubted it.” 

“ No, sir ; you didn’t say so.” 

Bradley Headstone looked at his finger again, took it out 
of the buttonhole and looked at it closer, bit the side of it and 
looked at it again. 

“You see, Hexam, you will be one of us. In good time 
you are sure to pass a creditable examination and become 
one of us. Then the question is — ” 

The boy waited so long for the question, while the school- 
master looked at a new side of his finger, and bit it, and 
looked at it again, that at length the boy repeated : 

“ The question is, sir — ? ” 

“ Whether you had not better leave well alone.” 

“ Is it well to leave my sister alone, Mr. Headstone ? ” 

“ I do not say so, because I do not know. I put it to you. 
I ask you to think of it. I want you to consider. You 
know how well you are doing here. ’ ’ 

“ After all, she got me here,” said the boy, with a struggle. 

“Perceiving the necessity of it,” acquiesced the school- 
master, “ and making up her mind fully to the separation.” 

The boy seemed to debate with himself. At length he 
said, raising his eyes to his master’s face : 

“ I wish you’d come with me and see her, Mr. Headstone, 
though she is not settled. I wish you’d come with me, and 
take her in the rough, and judge her for yourself.” 

“ You are sure you would not like to prepare her ? ” 

“My sister Lizzie wants no preparing, Mr. Headstone. 
What she is, she is, and shows herself to be. There’s no pre- 
tending about my sister.” 

His confidence in her sat more easily upon him than the 
indecision with which he had twice contended. It was his 
better nature to be true to her, if it were his worse nature to 
be wholly selfish. 

“Well, I can spare the evening,” said the schoolmaster, 
“lam ready to walk with you.” 


96 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Thank you, Mr. Headstone. And I am ready to go. ” 

Miss Peecher the schoolmistress was watering the flowers 
in the little dusty bit of garden attached to her small official 
residence^ with little windows like the eyes in needles, and 
little doors like the covers of school-books. 

Small, shining, neat, methodical, and buxom was Miss 
Peecher ; cherry-cheeked and tuneful of voice. A little pin- 
cushion, a little housewife, a little book, a little workbox, 
a little set of tables of weights and measures, and a little 
woman, all in one. If Mr. Bradley Headstone had addressed 
a written proposal of marriage to her, she would probably 
have replied in a complete little essay on the theme exactly a 
slate long, but would certainly have replied Yes. For she 
loved him. The decent hair-guard that went round his neck 
and took care of his decent silver watch was an object of 
envy to her. So would Miss Peecher have gone round his 
neck and taken care of him. Of him, insensible. Because 
he did not love Miss Peecher. 

Miss Peecher’s favorite pupil, who assisted her in her little 
household, was in attendance with a can of water to replen- 
ish her little watering-pot, and sufficiently divined the state 
of Miss Peecher’s affections to feel it necessary that she her- 
self should love young Charley Hexam. So there was a 
double palpitation among the double stocks and double wall- 
flowers, when the master and the boy looked over the gate. 

“ A fine evening. Miss Peecher,” said the Master. 

“A very fine evening, Mr. Headstone,” said Miss Peech- 
er. Are you taking a walk ? ” 

“ Hexam and I are going to take a long walk.” 

Charming weather,” remarked Miss Peecher, “/or a 
long walk.” 

“ Ours is rather on business than mere pleasure,” said the 
Master. “ Grood-night, Miss Peecher.” 

“ Good-night, Mr. Headstone.” 

The pupil had been, in her state of pupilage, so imbued 
with the class-custom of stretching out an arm, as if to hail a 
cab or omnibus, whenever she found she had an observation 
on hand to offer to Miss Peecher, that she often did it in their 
domestic relations ; and she did it now. 

“ Well, Mary Anne ? ” said Miss Peecher. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 97 

“ If you please, ma’am, Hexam said they were going to see 
liis sister.” 

But that can’t be, I think,” returned Miss Beecher : “ be- 
cause Mr. Headstone can have no business with her.'' 

Mary Anne again hailed. 

“ Well, Mary Anne ? ” 

If you please, ma’am, perhaps it’s Hexam’s business ? ” 

“That may be,” said Miss Beecher. “I didn’t think of 
that. Hot that it matters at all.” 

Mary Anne again hailed. 

“ Well, Mary Anne ? ” 

“ They say she’s very handsome.” 

“ Oh, Mary Anne, Mary Anne I ” returned Miss Beecher, 
slightly coloring and shaking her head, a little out of humor ; 
“ how often have I told you not to speak in that general 
way ? When you say they say, what do you mean ? Bart 
of speech They ? ” 

“ Bersonal pronoun, third person, plural number.” 

“ Then how many do you mean, Mary Anne ? Two ? 
Or more ? ” 

“I beg your pardon, ma’am,” said Mary Anne, “but I 
don’t know that I mean more than her brother himself.” 

“I felt convinced of it,” returned Miss Beecher, smiling 
again. “How pray, Mary Anne, be careful another time. 
He says is very different from they say, remember. Differ- 
ence between he says and they say ? Giive it me ? ” 

“ One is indicative mood, present tense, third person sin- 
gular, verb active to say. Other is indicative mood, present 
tense, third person plural, verb active to say.” 

“Very good indeed,” remarked Miss Beecher, with en- 
couragement. “ In fact, could not be better. Don’ t forget 
to apply it, another time, Mary Anne.” 

“ This must be where my sister lives, sir,” said Charley 
Hexam. “ This is where she came for a temporary lodging, 
soon after father’s death.” 

The boy knocked, and the door promptly opened with a 
spring and a click. A parlor door within a small entry 
stood open, and disclosed a child — a dwarf — a girl — a some- 
thing — sitting on a little low old-fashioned arm-chair, which 
had a kind of little working bench before it. 


98 


CONDENSED CLASSICS, 


‘‘ I can’t get up,” said the child, ‘‘ because my back’s bad, 
and my legs are queer. But I’m the person of the house.” 

“ Who else is at home ? ” asked Charley Hexam, staring. 
“Nobody’s at home at present,” returned the child, with 
a glib assertion of her dignity, “ except the person of the 
house. What did you want, young man ? ” 

“ I wanted to see my sister.” 

“Many young men have sisters,” returned the child. 
“ Grive me your name, young man ? ” 

“ Hexam is my name.” 

“ Ah, indeed,” said the person of the house. “ I thought 
it might be. Your sister will be in, in about a quarter of an 
hour. I am very fond of your sister. She’s my particular 
friend. Take a seat. And this gentleman’s name ? ” 

“ Mr. Headstone, my schoolmaster.” 

“ Take a seat. You can't tell me the name of my trade, 
I’ll be bound,” she said, after taking several observations. 
“ I’m a Doll’s Dressmaker.” 

“ I hope it’s a good business ? ” 

The person of the house shrugged her shoulders and shook 
her head. “ No. Poorly paid. And I’m often so pressed 
for time ! I had a doll married, last week, and was obliged 
to work all night.” 

“ Are you always as busy as you are now ? ” 

“ Busier. I’m slack just now. I finished a large mourn- 
ing order the day before yesterday. Doll I work for, lost a 
canary bird.” The person of the house gave another little 
laugh, and then nodded her head several times, as who 
should moralize, “ Oh this world, this world I ” 

“Are you alone all day?” asked Bradley Headstone. 
“ Don’t any of the neighboring children — ? ” 

“Ah, lud! ” cried the person of the house, with a little 
scream, as if the word had pricked her. “ Don’t talk of chil- 
dren. I can’t bear children, /know their tricks and their 
manners. Give me grown-ups. I always did like grown- 
ups, and always kept company with them. So sensible. Sit 
so quiet. Don’t go prancing and capering about ! And I 
mean always to keep among none but grown-ups till I mar- 
ry. I suppose I must make up my mind to marry, one of 
these days.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


99 


She listened to a step outside that caught her ear, and 
there was a soft knock at the door. Pulling at a handle with- 
in her reach, she said, with a pleased laugh : “ Now here, for 
instance, is a grown-up that’s my particular friend I ” and 
Lizzie Hexam in a black dress entered the room. 

“Charley! You!” 

Taking him to her arms in the old way — of which he 
seemed a little ashamed — she saw no one else. 

“ There, there, there, Liz, all right, my dear. See I Here’s 
Mr. Headstone come with me.” 

Her eyes met those of the schoolmaster, who had evi- 
dently expected to see a very different sort of person, and a 
murmured word or two of salutation passed between them. 
She was a little flurried by the unexpected visit, and the 
schoolmaster was not at his ease. But he never was, quite. 

“ I told Mr. Headstone you were not settled, Liz, but he 
was so kind as to take an interest in coming, and so I brought 
him. How well you look 1 ” 

Bradley seemed to think so. 

“ I didn’t expect a visit from you, Charley,” said his sister. 
“ I supposed that if you wanted to see me you would have 
sent to me, appointing me to come somewhere near the 
school, as I did last time. Charley always does well, Mr. 
Headstone ? ” 

“ He could not do better. I regard his course as quite 
plain before him.” 

“ I hoped so. I am so thankful. So well done of you, 
Charley, dear 1 It is better for me not to come (except when 
he wants me) between him and his prospects. You think 
so, Mr. Headstone ? ” 

Conscious that his pupil-teacher was looking for his an- 
swer, and that he himself had suggested the boy’s keeping 
aloof from this sister, now seen for the first time face to face, 
Bradley Headstone stammered : 

“ Your brother is very much occupied, you know. He 
has to work hard. One cannot but say that the less his at- 
tention is diverted from his work, the better for his future. 
When he shall have established himself, why then — it will 
be another thing then.” 

Lizzie shook her head again, and returned, with a quiet 


100 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


smile : “ I always advised him as you advise him. Did I not, 
Charley?” 

Well, never mind that now,” said the boy. “ How are 
you getting on? ” 

“ V ery well, Charley. I want for nothing.” 

“ You have your own room here ? ” 

Oh yes. And it’s quiet, and pleasant, and airy.” 

Lizzie, who had not taken off her bonnet, rather hurriedly 
proposed that as the room was getting dark they should go 
out into the air. 

“ I’ll saunter on by the river,” said Bradley. ‘‘ You will 
be glad to talk together.” 

As his uneasy figure went on before them among the 
evening sliadows, the boy said to his sister, petulantly : 

“ When are you going to settle yourself in some Christian 
sort of place, Liz ? I thought you were going to do it before 
now.” 

“ I am very well where I am, Charley.” 

“Yery well where you are! I am ashamed to have 
brought Mr. Headstone with me. How came you to get in- 
to such company as that little witch’s ? ” 

“ By chance at first, as it seemed, Charley. But I think it 
must have been by something more than chance, for that 
child — You remember the bills upon the walls at home ? ” 
Confound the bills upon the walls at home 1 I want to 
forget the bills upon the walls at home, and it would be bet- 
ter for you to do the same,” grumbled the boy. “Well; 
what of them?” 

“ This child is the grandchild of the terrible drunken old 
man, in the list slippers and the nightcap. Her father is like 
his own father, a weak wretched trembling creature, falling 
to pieces, never sober. But a good workman too, at the 
work he does. The mother is dead.” 

“ I don’t see what you have to do with her, for all that,” 
said the boy. 

“ Don’t you, Charley ? Any compensation — restitution 
— never mind the word, you know my meaning. Father’s 
grave.” 

But he did not respond with any tenderness. After a 
moody silence he broke out in an ill-used tone : 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


101 


It’ll be a very hard thing, Liz, if, when I am trying my 
best to get up in the world, you pull me back.” 

“I, Charley?” 

“ Y es, you, Liz. Why can’t you let bygones be bygones ? 
Why can’t you, as Mr. Headstone said to me this very even- 
ing about another matter, leave well alone ? What we have 
got to do, is, to turn our faces full in our new direction, and 
keep straight on. I don’t want, as I raise myself, to shake 
you off, Liz. I want to carry you up with me. W ell then. 
Don’t pull me back, and hold me down. That’s all I ask, and 
surely that’s not unconscionable. Come ! There’s Mr. 
Headstone stopping, and looking over the wall at the tide, to 
hint that it’s time to go. Kiss me, and tell me that you 
know I didn’t mean to hurt you.” 

She told him so, and they embraced, and walked on and 
came up with the schoolmaster. 

“ But we go your sister’s way,” he remarked, when the 
boy told him he was ready. And with his cumbrous and 
uneasy action he stiffly offered her his arm. Her hand was 
just within it, when she drew it back. He looked round 
with a start, as if he thought she had detected something 
that repelled her, in the momentary touch. 

“ I will not go in just yet,” said Lizzie. “ And you have a 
distance before you, and will walk faster without me.” 

Being by this time close to Yauxhall Bridge, they re- 
solved, in consequence, to take that way over the Thames, 
and they left her ; Bradley Headstone giving her his hand 
at parting, and she thanking him for his care of her 
brother. 

The master and the pupil walked on rapidly and silently. 
They had nearly crossed the bridge, when a gentleman came 
coolly sauntering towards them, with a cigar in his mouth, 
his coat thrown back, and his hands behind him. 

“ Who is that you stare after ? ” asked Bradley. 

Why ! ” said the boy, “ It is that Wrayburn one I ” 

Bradley Headstone scrutinized the boy as closely as the 
boy had scrutinized' the gentleman. 

‘‘ You don’t appear to like your friend, Hexam ? ” 

“ I don’t like him,” said the boy. 

“ Why not ? ” 


102 


CONDENSED CLASSICS, 


“ He took hold of me by the chin in a precious imperti- 
nent way, the first time I ever saw him,” said the boy. 

“ Again, why ? ” 

“ For nothing. Or — it’s much the same — because some- 
thing I happened to say about my sister didn’t happen to 
please him.” 

“ Then he knows your sister ? ” 

“ He didn’t at that time,” said the boy. 

Does now ? ” 

^‘Yes, sir.” 

Groing to see her, I dare say.” 

“ It can’t be ! ” said the boy, quickly. “ He doesn’t know 
her well enough. I should like to catch him at it ! The first 
time he came to our old place was when my father was 
afive. He came on business ; not that it was his business — 
he never had any business — he was brought by a friend.” 

And the other times ? ” 

“ There was only one other time that I know of. When 
my father was killed by accident, he chanced to be one of 
the finders. He was mooning about, I suppose, taking 
liberties with people’s chins ; but there he was, somehow. 
He brought the news home to my sister early in the 
morning, and brought Miss Abbey Potterson, a neighbor, 
to help break it to her. He was mooning about the 
house when I was fetched home in the afternoon — they 
didn’t know where to find me till my sister could be 
brought round sufficiently to teU them — and then he mooned 
away.” 

“ And is that all ? ” 

“That’s all, sir.” 

Bradley Headstone gradually released the boy’s arm, as 
if he were thoughtful, and they walked on side by side as be- 
fore. After a long silence between them, Bradley resumed 
the talk. 

“ I suppose — your sister — ” with a curious break both be- 
fore and after the words, “ has received hardly any teaching, 
Hexam ? ” 

“ Hardly any, sir.” 

“ Yet — your sister — scarcely looks or speaks like an igno- 
rant person.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


103 


“ Lizzie has as much thought as the best, Mr. Headstone. 
I have never brought myself to mention it openly to you ; 
but it’s a painful thing to think that if I get on as well as you 
hope, I shall be — I won’t say disgraced, because I don’t 
mean disgraced — but — rather put to the blush if it was 
known — by a sister who has been very good to me.” 

Yes,” said Bradley Headstone in a slurring way, for his 
mind scarcely seemed to touch that point, so smoothly did 
it glide to another, “ and there is this possibility to consider. 
Some man who had worked his way might come to admire 
— your sister — and might even in time bring himself to 
think of marrying — your sister — and it would be a sad 
drawback and a heavy penalty upon him, if, overcoming in 
his mind other inequalities of condition and other considera- 
tions against it, this inequality and this consideration re- 
mained in full force.” 

“ That’s true, sir. Sometimes since Lizzie was left free 
by father’s death, I have thought that such a young woman 
might soon acquire more than enough to pass muster. And 
sometimes I have even thought that perhaps Miss Beech- 
er — ” 

“ For the purpose I would advise Hot Miss Beecher,” 
Bradley Headstone struck in, with a recurrence of his late 
decision of manner. 

W ould you be so kind as to think of it for me ? ” 


“ Yes, Hexam, yes. I’ll think of it. I’ll think maturely 
of it. I’ll think well of it.” 


CHABTER XVIII. 



iHE person of the house, dolls dressmaker, sat in her 


X quaint little low arm-chair, singing in the dark, until 
Lizzie came back. 

“Well Lizzie-Mizzie-Wizzie,” said she, breaking off in 
her song. “ What’s the news out-of-doors ? ” 

“ What’s the news in-doors?” returned Lizzie, playfully 
smoothing the bright long fair hair which grew very luxuri- 
ant and beautiful on the head of the doll’s dressmaker. 

. “ Let me see, said the blind man. Why, the last news is, 
that I don’t mean to marry your brother.” 


104 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


No-o,” shaking her head and her chin. “ Don’t hke the 
boy.” 

“ What do you say to his master ? ” 

“ I say that I think he’s bespoke.” 

Miss Wren suddenly screwed up her eyes and her chin, 
and looked prodigiously knowing, “ Aha I 

“Who comes here? 

“ A Grenadier. 

“What does he want? 

A pot of beer. 

And nothing else in the world, my dear.” 

A man’s figure paused on the pavement at the outer door. 
“ Mr. Eugene Wray burn, ain’t it ? ” said Miss Wren. 

“ So I am told,” was the answer. 

“ You may come in, if you’re good.” 

“ I am not good,” said Eugene, “ but I’ll come in.” 

He gave his hand to J enny Wren, and he gave his hand to 
Lizzie, and he stood leaning by the door at Lizzie’s side. He 
had been strolling with his cigar, he said (it was smoked out 
and gone by this time), and he had strolled round to return 
in that direction that he might look in as he passed. Had 
she not seen her brother to-night ? 

“ Yes,” said Lizzie, whose manner was a little troubled. 

G-racious condescension on our brother’s part ! Mr. Eu- 
gene W ray burn thought he had passed my young gentle- 
man on the bridge. Who was his friend with him ? , 

‘‘ The schoolmaster.” 

“To be sure. Looked hke it,” said Eugene. “I have 
nothing to report, Lizzie, but having promised you that an 
eye should be always kept on Mr. Riderhood through my 
friend Lightwood, I like occasionally to renew my assurance 
that I keep my promise, and keep my friend up to the mark.” 

“ I should not have doubted it, sir.” 

“ G-enerally, I confess myself a man to be doubted,” re- 
turned Eugene, coolly, “ for all that.” 

“ Why are you ? ” asked the sharp Miss Wren. 

“ Because, my dear, I am a bad idle dog.” 

“ Then why don’t you reform, and be a good dog ? ” in- 
quired Miss Wren. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


105 


Because, my dear, there’s nobody who makes it worth 
my while. Have you considered my suggestion, Lizzie? ” 
This in a lower voice, but only as if it were a graver matter ; 
not at all to the exclusion of the person of the house. 

“ I have thought of it, Mr. Wray burn, but I have not been 
able to make up my mind to accept it.” 

“ False pride ! ” said Eugene. ' 

I think not, Mr. Wray burn. I hope not.” 

False pride! ” repeated Eugene. “Why, what else is 
it ? The thing is worth nothing in itself. The thing is 
worth nothing to me. What can it be worth to me ? You 
know the most I make of it. I propose to be of some use to 
somebody — which I never was in this world, and never 
shall be on any other occasion — by paying some qualified 
person of your own sex and age, so many (or rather so few) 
contemptible shillings, to come here, certain nights in the 
week, and give you certain instruction which you wouldn’t 
want if you hadn’t been a self-denying daughter and sister. 
You know that it’s good to have it, or you would never have 
so devoted yourself to your brother’s having it. Then why 
not have it: especially when our friend Miss Jenny here 
would profit by it too ? If I proposed to be the teacher, or 
to attend the lessons — obviously incongruous I — but as to 
that, I might as well be on the other side of the globe, or not 
on the globe at all. Y our false pride does wrong to yourself 
and does wrong to your dead father.” 

“ How to my father, Mr. Wray burn ? ” she asked. 

“ How to your father ? Can you ask I By determining 
mat the deprivation to which he condemned you, and which 
he forced upon you, shall always rest upon his head.” 

It chanced to be a subtle string to sound, in her wdio had 
so spoken to her brother within the hour. It sounded f ar 
more forcibly, because of the change in the speaker for the 
moment; the passing appearance of earnestness, complete 
conviction, injured resentment of suspicion, generous and 
unselfish interest. All these qualities, in him usually so 
light and careless, she felt to be inseparable from some touch 
of their opposites in her own breast. She thought, had she, 
so far below him and so different, rejected this disinterest- 
edness because of some vain misgiving that he sought her 


106 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


out, or heeded any personal attractions that he might descry 
in her ? The poor girl, pure of heart and purpose, could not 
bear to think it. Sinking before her own eyes, as she sus- 
pected herself of it, she drooped her head as though she had 
done him some wicked and grievous injury, and broke into 
silent tears. 

“ Don’t be distressed,” said Eugene, very, very kindly. 
“ I hope it is not I who have distressed you. I meant no 
more than to put the matter in its true light before you ; 
though I acknowledge I did it selfishly enough, for I am dis- 
appointed.” 

Disappointed of doing her a service. How else could he 
be disappointed ? 

“ It won’t break my heart,” laughed Eugene ; “It won’t 
stay by me eight-and-forty hours ; but I am genuinely dis- 
appointed. I had set my fancy on doing this little thing for 
you and for our friend Miss Jenny. The novelty of my do- 
ing anything in the least useful, had its charms. I see, now, 
that I might have managed it better. I might have affected 
to do it wholly for our friend Miss J. I might have got my- 
self up, morally, as Sir Eugene Bountiful. But upon my 
soul I can’t make flourishes, and I would rather be disap- 
pointed than try.” 

If he meant to follow home what was in Lizzie’s thoughts, 
it was skillfully done. If he followed it by mere fortuitous 
coincidence, it was done by an evil chance. 

“ If you had quite understood my whole meaning at first, 
I think you would not have refused. Do you think you 
would ? ” 

“ I — I don’t know that I should, Mr. Wray burn.” 

“ Well! Then why refuse, now you do understand it? 
Lizzie ITexam, as I truly respect you, and as I am your 
friend and a poor devil of a gentleman, I protest I don’t even 
now understand why you hesitate.” 

There was an appearance of openness, trustfulness, un- 
suspecting generosity, in his wmrds and manner, that won 
the poor girl over ; and not only won her over, but again 
caused her to feel as though she had been influenced by the 
opposite qualities, with vanity at their head. 

“I will not hesitate any longer, Mr. Wray burn. I hope 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


107 


you will not think the worse of me for having hesitated at 
all. For myself and for Jenny I thankfully accept your 
kind offer.” 

“Agreed! Dismissed! ” said Eugene, giving Lizzie his 
hand before lightly waving it, as if he waved the whole sub- 
ject away. “I hope it may not be often that so much is 
made of so little ! ” 

Then he fell to talking playfully with Jenny Wren, who 
said at last, “ W ell, it’s Saturday night, and my child’s com- 
ing home. And my child is a troublesome bad child, and 
costs me a world of scolding. I would rather you didn’t see 
my child.” 

“ A doll ? ” said Eugene. 

But Lizzie, with her lips only, shaping the two words, 
“ Her father,” he took his leave immediately. At the corner 
of the street he stopped to light another cigar, and possibly 
to ask himself what he was doing otherwise. If so, the an- 
swer was indefinite and vague. Who knows what he is do- 
ing, who is careless what he does ? 

A man stumbled against him as he turned away, who 
mumbled some maudlin apology. Looking after this man, 
Eugene saw him go in at the door by which he himself had 
just-come out. 

On the man’s stumbling into the room, Lizzie rose to leave. 

“Don’t go away. Miss Hexam,” he said in a submissive 
manner, speaking tliickly and with difficulty. “ Don’t fly 
from unfortunate man in shattered state of health. Give 
poor invalid honor of your company. It ain’t — ain’t catch- 
ing.’’ 

Lizzie murmured that she had something to do in her own 
room, and went away up-stairs. 

“How’s my Jenny?” said the man timidly. “How’s 
my Jenny Wren, best of children, object dearest affections 
broken-hearted invalid ? ” 

To which the person of the house, stretching out her arm 
in an attitude of command, replied with irresponsive asper- 
ity : “ Go along with you ! Go along into your corner ! 
Get into your corner directly ! ” 

The wretched spectacle made as if he would have offered 
some remonstrance ; but not venturing to resist the person 


108 


CONDENSED CLASSICS, 


of the house, thought better of it, and went and sat down on 
a particular chair of disgrace. 

Oh-h-h ! ” cried the person of the house, pointing her 
little finger, ‘‘You bad old boy ! 0-h-h you naughty wick- 

ed creature ! I know your tricks and your manners, I know 
where you’ve been to! ” (which indeed it did not require 
discernment to discover). “ Oh, you disgraceful old chap 1 ” 

“ Poor shattered invalid. Trouble nobody long,” cried 
the wretched figure. 

“ Come, come I ” said the person of the house, “you know 
w'hat you’ve got to do. Put down your money tliis in- 
stant.” 

Such a business as he made of collecting it from his dogs’- 
eared pockets ; of expecting it in this pocket, and not find- 
ing it; of not expecting it in that pocket, and passing it 
over ; of finding no pocket where that other pocket ought 
to be I 

“ Is this all ? ” demanded the person of the house, when a 
confused heap of pence and shillings lay on the table. 
“ Turn all your pockets inside out, and leave ’em so ! ” 

He obeyed. And if anything could have made him look 
more abject or more dismally ridiculous than before, it 
would have been his so displaying himself. 

“ Here’s but seven and eightpence halfpenny I Oh you 
prodigal old son I G-et along with you to bed 1 ” 


CHAPTER XIX. 



ASCIXATIOX FLEDG-EBY was the meanest cur ex- 


j: isting, with a single pair of legs. 

Whether this young gentleman (for he was but three- 
and-twenty) combined with the miserly vice of an old man, 
any of the open-handed vices of a young one, was a moot 
point ; so very honorably did he keep his own counsel. He 
was sensible of the value of appearances as an investment, 
and liked to dress well ; but he drove a bargain for every 
movable about him, from the coat on his back to the china 
on his breakfast- table ; and every bargain, by representing 
somebody’s ruin or somebody’s loss, acquired a peculiar 
charm for him. It was a part of his avarice to take, within 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


109 


narrow bounds, long odds at races; if he won, he drove 
harder bargains ; if he lost, he half starved himself until next 
time. 

He feigned to be a young gentleman living on his means, 
but was known secretly to be a kind of outlaw in the bill- 
broking line. 

It was a public holiday, and Fledgeby, walking into 
the City in the holiday afternoon, walked against a living 
stream setting out of it; and thus, when he turned into the 
precincts of St. Mary Axe, he found a prevalent repose and 
quiet there. A yellow overhanging plaster-fronted house 
at w'hich he stopped was quiet too. The blinds were all 
drawn down, and the inscription Pubsey and Co. seemed to 
doze in the counting-house window on the ground-floor 
giving on the sleepy street. 

Fledgeby knocked and rang, and Fledgeby rang and 
knocked, but no one came. Fledgeby crossed the narrow 
street and looked up at the house-windows, but nobody 
looked down at Fledgeby. He got out of temper, crossed 
the narrow street again, and pulled the house-bell as if it 
were the house’s nose, and he pulled and continued to pull, 
until a human nose appeared in the dark door-way. 

How you, sir ! These are nice games ! ” 

He addressed an old Jewish man in an ancient coat, long 
of skirt, and wide of pocket. A venerable man, bald and 
shining at the top of his head, and with long gray hair flow- 
ing down at its sides and mingling with his beard. A man 
who with a graceful Eastern action of homage bent his head, 
and stretched out his hands with the palms downward, as if 
to deprecate the wrath of a superior. 

“ What have you been up to ? ” said Fledgeby. 

G-enerous Christian master,” urged the Jewish man, “ it 
being holiday, I looked for no one.” 

“ Holiday be blowed ! ” said Fledgeby, entering. “ What 
have you got to do with holidays ? Shut the door.” 

Fledgeby turned into the counting-house, perched him- 
self on a business stool, and cocked his hat. There were 
light boxes on shelves in the counting-house, and strings of 
mock beads hanging up. There were samples of cheap 
clocks and cheap vases of flowers. Foreign toys, all. 


110 


CONDEJS^SED CLASSICS. 


“You have not told me what you were up to, you sir/’ 
said Fledgeby, scratching his head with the brim of his hat. 

“ Sir, I was breathing the air.” 

“ In the cellar, that you didn’t hear ? ” 

“On the house-top.” 

“ Upon my soul I That’s a way of doing business.” 

“ Sir,” the old man represented with a grave and patient 
air, “ there must be two parties to the transaction of busi- 
ness, and the holiday has left me alone.” 

“ Ah ! Can’t be buyer and seller too. That’s what the 
Jews say; ain’t it?” 

“ At least we say truly, if we say so,” answered the old 
man with a smile. 

“ Your people need speak the truth sometimes, for they lie 
enough,” remarked Fascination Fledgeby. “For instance 
you would persuade me if you could, that you are a poor 
Jew. I wish you’d confess how much you really did make 
out of my late governor.” 

“ I had had sickness and misfortunes, and was so poor,” 
said the old man, “ as hopelessly to owe the father, principal 
and interest. The son inheriting, was so merciful as to for- 
give me both, and place me here.” 

“ Riah, who believes you to be poor now ? ” 

“ No one,” said the old man. “No one. All scout it as a 
fable. W ere I to say ‘ This little fancy business is not mine ; 
it is the little business of a Christian young gentleman who 
places me, his servant, in trust and charge here, and to whom 
I am accountable for every single bead,’ they would laugh. 
When, in the larger money-business, I tell the borrowers — ” 

“ I say old chap ! ” interposed Fledgeby, “ I hope you 
mind what you do tell ’em ? ” 

“Sir, I tell them no more than I am about to repeat. 
When I tell them ‘ I cannot promise this, I cannot answer 
for the other, I must see my principal, I have not the money, 
I am a poor man and it does not rest with me,’ they are so 
unbelieving and so impatient, that they sometimes curse me 
in Jehovah’s name.” 

“ That’s deuced good, that is ! ” said Fledgeby. 

“ And at other times they say, ‘ Can it never be done with- 
out these tricks, Mr. Riali? Come, come, Mr. Riah, we 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


Ill 


know the arts of your people ’ — my people ! — ‘ If the money 
is to be lent, fetch it, fetch it ; if it is not to be lent, keep it and 
say so.’ They never believe me.” 

Thafs all right,” said Fascination Fledgeby. ‘‘Look 
here, Riah, I want to go a little more into buying up queer 
bills. Look out in that direction. And there’s one thing 
more. Come to me with the books for periodical inspection 
as usual, at eight on Monday morning.” 

Riah drew some tablets from his breast and noted it down. 
“ That’s all I wanted to say at the present time,” contin- 
ued Fledgeby in a grudging vein, as he got off the stool, “ ex- 
cept that I wish you’d take the air where you can hear the 
bell, or the knocker, either one of the two or both. By-the- 
bye, how do you take the air at the top of the house ? Do 
you stick your head out of a chimney-pot ? ” 

“ Sir, there are leads there, and I have made a little garden 
there.” 

“ To bury your money in, you old dodger ? ” 

“ A thumb-nail’s space of garden would hold the treasure 
/bury, master,” said Riah. “ Twelve shillings a w^eek, even 
when they are an old man’s wages, bury themselves.” 

“ I should like to know what you really are worth,’’ re- 
turned Fledgeby, with whom his growing rich on that sti- 
pend and gratitude W’as a very convenient fiction. “But 
come ! Let’s have a look at your garden on the tiles ! ” 

The old man took a step back, and hesitated. 

“ Truly, sir, I have company there.” 

“ Have you, by Greorge ! ” said Fledgeby : “ I suppose you 
happen to know whose premises these are ? ” 

“ Sir, they are yours, and I am your servant in them.” 

“ Oh ! I thought you might have overlooked that,” re- 
torted Fledgeb}^, with his eyes on Riah’s beard as he felt for 
his own ; “ having company on my premises, you know ! ” 

“ Come up and see the guests, sir. I hope for your admis- 
sion that they can do no harm.” 

Some final wooden steps conducted them, stooping under 
a low penthouse roof, to the house-top. Riah stood still, 
and, turning to his master, pointed out his guests. 

Lizzie Hexam and Jenny Wren. For whom, perhaps 
with some old instinct of his race, the gentle Jew had spread 


112 


CONDEJSSED CLASSICS. 


a carpet. Seated on it, against no more romantic object 
than a blackened chimney-stack over which some humble 
creeper had been trained, they both pored over one book. 

When they returned to the entry, Fledgeby said to the 
old man : 

“ That’s a handsome girl, that one in her senses.” 

And as good as handsome,” answered Kiah. 

“At all events,” observed Fledgeby, with a dry whistle, 
“ I hope she ain’t bad enough to put any chap up to the fast- 
enings, and get the premises broken open. Y ou look out. 
Keep your weather eye awake, and don’t make any more 
acquaintances, however handsome. Of course you always 
keep my name to yourseK ? ” 

“ Sir, assuredly I do.” 

“ If they ask it, say it’s Pubsey, or say it’s Co, or say it’s 
anything you like, but what it is.” 

CHAPTER XX. 

A gain Mr. Mortimer Lightwood and Mr. Eugene 
W ray burn sat together in the Temple. This evening, 
however, they were not together in the place of business of 
the eminent solicitor, but in another dismal set of chambers 
facing it on the same second floor ; on whose dungeon-like 
outer-door appeared the legend : 

Private. 

Mr. Eugene W rayburn. 

Mr. Mortimer Lightwood. 

Mr. Lightwood' s Offices opposite.) 
Appearances indicated that this establishment was a very 
recent institution. The white letters of the inscription were 
extremely white and extremely strong to the sense of smell, 
the complexion of the tables and chairs was (like Lady Tip- 
pins’ s) a little too blooming to be believed in, and the carpets 
and floor-cloth seemed to rush at the beholder’s face in the 
unusual prominency of their patterns. 

“ Well ! ” said Eugene, on one side of the fire, “ I feel tol- 
erably comfortable. I hope the upholsterer may do the 
same.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


113 


“ Why shouldn’t he ? ” asked Lightwood, from the other 
side of the fire. 

“ To be sure,’’ pursued Eugene, reflecting, “he is not in 
the secret of our pecuniary affairs, so perhaps he may be in 
an easy frame of mind.” 

“We shall pay him,” said Mortimer. 

“ Shall we, really ? ” returned Eugene, indolently sur- 
prised. “You don’t say so ! ” 

“ I mean to pay him, Eugene, for my part,” said Mortimer, 
in a slightly injured tone. 

“Ah I I mean to pay him too,” retorted Eugene. “But 
then I mean so much that I — that I don’t mean.” 

“Don’t mean?” 

“ So much that I only mean and shall always only mean 
and nothing more, my dear Mortimer. It’s the same thing.” 

Mortimer laughed with his usual commentaries of “ How 
can you be so ridiculous, Eugene ! ” and “ What an absurd 
fellow you are ! ” but when his laugh was out, there was 
something serious, if not anxious, in his face. 

“Eugene,” said he, “if I could find you in earnest for a 
minute, I would try to say an earnest word to you.” 

“ An earnest word ? ” repeated Eugene. “ Say on.” 

“ W ell, I will,” returned the other. “ All this past summer 
you have been withholding something from me. I don’t 
ask what it is, as you have not told me ; but the fact is so. 
Say, isit not? ” 

“ I give you my word of honor, Mortimer,” returned Eu- 
gene, after a serious pause of a few moments, “ that I don’t 
know.” 

“Don’t know, Eugene ? ” 

“ Upon my soul, don’t know. I know less about myself 
than about most people in the world, and I don’t know.” 

“ You have some design in your mind ? ” 

“Havel? I don’t think I have.” 

“At any rate, you have some subject of interest there 
which used not to be there ? ” 

“I really can’t say,” replied Eugene, shaking his head 
blankly, after pausing again to reconsider. “ At times I 
have thought yes ; at other times I have thought no. How, 
I have been inclined to pursue such a subject; now I have 
8 


114 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


felt that it was absurd, and that it tired and embarrassed me. 
Absolutely, I can’t say. Frankly and faithfully, I would if 
I could.” 

So replying, he clapped a hand on his friend’s shoulder, as 
he rose from his seat upon the bed, and said : 

“ Come, dear boy ! Let us try the effect of smoking. If 
it enlightens me at all on this question, I will impart unre- 
servedly.” 

They returned to the room they had come from, and find- 
ing it heated, opened a window. Having lighted their 
cigars, they leaned out of this window, smoking, and look- 
ing down at the moonlight, as it shone into the court below. 

“Ho enlightenment,” resumed Eugene, after certain min- 
utes of silence. “ I feel sincerely apologetic, my dear Mor- 
timer, but nothing comes.” 

“If nothing comes,” returned Mortimer, “nothing can 
come from it. So I shall hope that this may hold good 
throughout, and that there may be nothing on foot. Noth- 
ing injurious to you, Eugene, or — ” 

Eugene stayed him for a moment with his hand on his 
arm, while he took a piece of earth from an old flower-pot 
on the window-sill and dexterously shot it at a little point of 
light opposite; having done which to his satisfaction, he 
said, “Or?” 

“Or injurious to any one else.” 

“ How^” said Eugene, taking another little piece of earth, 
and shooting it with great precision at the former mark, 
“ how injurious to any one else.” 

“ I don’t know.” 

“ And,” said Eugene, taking, as he said the word, another 
shot, “ to whom else ? ” 

“I don’t know.” 

Checking himself with another piece of earth in his hand, 
Eugene looked at his friend inquiringly and a little suspi- 
ciously. 

“ Two belated wanderers in the mazes of the law,” said 
he, “ stray into the court. They examine the door-posts of 
number one, seeking the name they want. Not finding it at 
number one, they come to number two. On the hat of wan- 
derer number two, the shorter one, I drop this pellet. Hit- 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


115 


ting him on the hat, I smoke serenely, and become absorbed 
in contemplation of the sky. When they emerge, you shall 
see me bring them both down ; ” and he prepared two pellets 
for the purpose. 

He had not reckoned on their seeking his name, or Light- 
wood’s. But now there came a knock at the door. “ I am 
on duty to-night,” said Mortimer, “ stay you where you are, 
Eugene.” Bequiring no persuasion, he stayed there, smok- 
ing quietly, not at all curious to know who knocked, until 
Mortimer spoke to him from within the room, and touched 
him. Then, drawing in his head, he found the visitors to be 
young Charley Hexam and the schoolmaster ; both standing 
facing him, and both recognized at a glance. 

“You recollect this young fellow, Eugene ? ” 

“ Let me look at him,” returned Wray burn, coolly. “ Oh, 
yes, yes. I recollect him ! ” 

“ He says he has something to say.” 

“ Surely it must be to you, Mortimer.’* 

“ So I thought, but he says no. He says it is to you.” 
“Yes, I do say so,” interposed the boy. “ And I mean to 
say what I want to say, too, Mr. Eugene Wrayburn ! ” 
Passing him with his eyes as if there were nothing where 
he stood, Eugene looked on to Bradley Headstone. With 
consummate indolence he turned to Mortimer, inquiring : 
“ And who may this other person be ? ” 

“I am Charles Hexam’s friend,” said Bradley; “I am 
Charles Hexam’s schoolmaster.” 

“ My good sir, you should teach your pupils better man- 
ners,” returned Eugene. 

Composedly smoking, he leaned an elbow on the chimney- 
piece, at the side of the fire, and looked at the schoolmaster. 
It was a cruel look, in its cold disdain of him, as a creature of 
no worth. The schoolmaster looked at him, and that, too, 
was a cruel look, though of the different kind, that it had a 
raging jealousy and fiery wrath in it. 

Yery remarkably, neither Eugene Wrayburn nor Bradley 
Headstone looked at all at the boy. Through the ensuing 
dialogue, those two, no matter who spoke, or who was ad- 
dressed, looked at each other. There was some secret, sure 
perception between them, which set them against one an- 
other in all ways. 


116 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


‘‘In some high respects, Mr. Eugene Wrayburn,” said 
Bradley, answering him with pale and quivering lips,“ the 
natural feelings of my pupils are stronger than my teach- 
ing.” 

“ In most respects, I dare say,” replied Eugene, enjoying 
his cigar, “ though whether high or low is of no importance. 
You have my name very correctly. Pray what is yours ? ” 

“ It cannot concern you much to know, but — ” 

“ True,” interposed Eugene, striking sharply and cutting 
him short at his mistake, “ it does not concern me at all to 
know. I can say Schoolmaster, which is a most respectable 
title. You are right. Schoolmaster.” 

It was not the dullest part of this goad in its galling of 
Bradley Headstone, that he had made it himself in a mo- 
ment of incautious anger. He tried to set his lips so as to 
prevent their quivering, but they quivered fast. 

“Mr. Eugene Wrayburn,” said the boy, “I want a word 
with you. I have wanted it so much, that we have looked 
out your address in the book, and we have been to your of- 
fice, and we have come from your office here.” 

“You have given yourself much trouble, Schoolmaster,” 
observed Eugene, blowing the feathery ash from his cigar. 
“ I hope it may prove remunerative.” 

“ And I am glad to speak,” pursued the boy, “ in presence 
of Mr. Lightwood, because it was through Mr. Lightwood 
that you ever saw my sister.” 

For a mere moment, Wrayburn turned his eyes aside from 
the schoolmaster to note the effect of the last word on Morti- 
mer, who, standing on the opposite side of the fire, as soon 
as the word was spoken, turned his face towards the fire and 
looked down into it. 

“ Similarly, it was through Mr. Lightwood that you ever 
saw her again, for you were with him on the night when my 
father was found, and so I found you with her on the next 
day. Since then, you have seen my sister often. Y ou have 
seen my sister oftener and oftener. And I want to know 
why ? ” 

“ Was this worth while. Schoolmaster? ” murmured Eu- 
gene. “ So much trouble for nothing ? You should know 
best, but I think not.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


117 


I don’t know, Mr. Wrayburn,” answered Bradley, with 
his passion rising, “ why you address me — ” 

“ Don’t you ? ” said Eugene. “ Then I won’t.” 

Not another word did Eugene deem it worth while to ut- 
ter, but stood leaning his head upon his hand, smoking, and 
looking imperturbably at the chafing Bradley Headstone 
with his clutching right-hand, until Bradley was well-nigh 
mad. 

Mr. Wrayburn,” proceeded the boy,“ we not only know 
this that I have charged upon you, but we know more. It 
has not yet come to my sister’s knowledge that we have 
found it out, but we have. We had a plan, Mr. Headstone 
and I, for my sister’s education, and for its being advised and 
overlooked by Mr. Headstone, who is a much more compe- 
tent authority, whatever you may pretend to think, as you 
smoke, than you could produce, if you tried. What do we 
find, Mr. Lightwood ? Why, we find that my sister is al- 
ready being taught, without our knowing it. We find that 
while my sister gives an unwilling and cold ear to our 
schemes for her advantage, she is willfully and willingly 
profiting by other schemes. Ay, and taking pains, too, for 
I know what such pains are. And so does Mr. Headstone ! 
Well ! Somebody pays for this, is a thought that naturally 
occurs to us; who pays ? We apply ourselves to find out, 
Mr. Lightwood, and we find that your friend, this Mr. Eu- 
gene Wrayburn, here, pays. Then I ask him what right has 
he to do it, and what does he mean by it, and how comes he to 
be taking such a liberty without my consent, when I am rais- 
ing myself in the scale of society by my own exertions and 
Mr.Headstone’s aid, and have no right to have any darkness 
cast upon my prospects, or any imputation upon my respec- 
tability, through my sister ? ” 

The boyish weakness of this speech, combined with its 
great selfishness, made it a poor one indeed. And yet 
Bradley Headstone, used to the little audience of a school, 
and unused to the larger ways of men, showed a kind of ex- 
ultation in it. 

‘‘Now I tell Mr. Eugene Wrayburn,” pursued the boy, 
forced into the use of the third person by the hopelessness of 
addressing him in the first, “ that I object to his having any 


118 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


acquaintance at all with my sister, and that I request him to 
drop it altogether. He is not to take it into his head that I 
am afraid of my sister’s caring for him — ” 

(As the boy sneered, the master sneered, and Eugene 
blew off the feathery ash again.) 

— “ But I object to it, and that’s enough. I am more im- 
portant to my sister than he thinks. As I raise myself, I in- 
tend to raise her ; she knows that, and she has to look to me 
for her prospects. How I understand all this very well, and 
so does Mr. Headstone. My sister is an excellent girl, but 
she has some romantic notions; not about such things as 
your Mr. Eugene Wrayburns, but about the death of my 
father and other matters of that sort. Mr. Wray burn en- 
courages those notions to make himself of importance, and 
so she thinks she ought to be grateful to him, and perhaps 
even likes to be. Now I don’t choose her to be grateful to 
him or to be grateful to anybody but me, except Mr. 
Headstone. And I tell Mr. Wray burn that if he don’t take 
heed of what I say, it will be worse for her. Let him turn 
that over in kis memory. W orse for her ! ” 

A pause ensued, in which the schoolmaster looked very 
awkward. 

May I suggest. Schoolmaster,” said Eugene, removing 
his fast-w ailing cigar from his lips to glance at it, “ that you 
can now take your pupil away.” 

‘‘ And Mr. Lightwood,” added the boy, with a burning 
face, under the flaming aggravation of getting no sort of an- 
swer or attention, I hope you’ll take notice of what I have 
said to your friend, and of what your friend has heard me 
say, word by word, whatever he pretends to the contrary. 
You are bound to take notice of it Mr. Lightwood, for, as I 
have already mentioned, you first brought your friend into 
my sister’s company, and but for you we never should have 
seen him. Lord knows none of us ever wanted him, any 
more than any of us will ever miss him. Now Mr. Head- 
stone, as Mr. Eugene Wray burn has been obliged to hear 
what I had to say, and couldn’t help himseff, and as I have 
said it out to the last word, we have done all we wanted to, 
and may go.” 

“ Go down-stairs, and leave me a moment, Hexam,” he 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


119 


returned. The boy complying with an indignant look and 
as much noise as he could make, swung out of the room ; 
and Lightwood went to the window, and leaned there, 
looking out. 

“ You think me of no more value than the dirt under your 
feet,” said Bradley, speaking in a carefully weighed and 
measured tone, or he could not have spoken at all. 

assure you, Schoolmaster,” replied Eugene, “I don’t 
think about you.” 

“ That’s not true,” returned the other; “you know bet- 
ter.” 

“ That’s coarse,” Eugene retorted ; “ but you don't know 
better.” 

“ Mr. Wrayburn, at least I know very well that it would 
be idle to set myself against you in insolent words or over- 
bearing manners. That lad who has just gone out could put 
you to shame in half-a-dozen branches of knowledge in half 
an hour, but you can throw him aside like an inferior. You 
can do as much by me, I have no doubt, beforehand.” 

“ Possibly,” remarked Eugene. 

“But I am more than a lad,” said Bradley, with his 
clutching hand, “ and I will be heard, sir.” 

“As a schoolmaster,” said Eugene, “you are always be- 
ing heard. That ought to content you.” 

“But it does not content me,” replied the other, white 
with passion. “ Do you suppose that a man, in forming 
himself for the duties I discharge, and in watching and re- 
pressing himself daily to discharge them well, dismisses a 
man’s nature ? ” 

“ I suppose you,” said Eugene, “judging from what I see 
as I look at you, to be rather too passionate for a good school- 
master.” As he spoke, he tossed away the end of his cigar. 

“Passionate with you, sir, I admit I am. Passionate 
with you, sir, I respect myself for being. But I have not 
devils for my pupils.” 

“ For your teachers, I should rather say,” replied Eugene. 

“ Mr. Wrayburn.” 

“ Schoolmaster.” 

“ Sir, my name is Bradley Headstone.” 

“ As you justly said, my good sir, your name cannot con- 
cern me. Now, what more ? ” 


120 


COJSODENSED CLASSICS. 


“ This more. Oh, what a misfortune is mine,” cried Brad- 
ley, breaking off to wipe the starting perspiration from his 
face as he shook from head to foot, “ that I cannot so control 
myself as to appear a stronger creature than this, when a 
man who has not felt in all his life what I have felt in a day 
can so command himself ! ” He said it in a very agony, and 
even followed it with an errant motion of his hands as if he 
could have torn himself. 

Eugene Wrayburn looked on at him, as if he found him 
beginning to be rather an entertaining study. 

“ Mr. Wrayburn, I desire to say something to you on my 
own part.” 

“ Come, come, Schoolmaster,” returned Eugene, with a 
languid approach to impatience as the other again struggled 
with himself ; “ say what you have to say. And let me re- 
mind you that the door is standing open, and your young 
friend waiting for you on the stairs.” 

“ When I accompanied that youth here, sir, I did so with 
the purpose of adding, as a man whom you should not be 
permitted to put aside, in case you put him aside as a boy, 
that his instinct is correct and right.” Thus Bradley Head- 
stone, with great effort and difficulty. 

“ Is that all ? ” asked Eugene. 

“Ho, sir,” said the other, flushed and fierce. “ I strongly 
support him in his disapproval of your visits to his sister, and 
in his objection to your officiousness — and worse — in what 
you have taken upon yourseh to do for her.” 

“ Is that all ? ” asked Eugene. 

“ Ho, sir. I determined to teU you that you are not justi- 
fied in these proceedings, and that they are injurious to his 
sister.” 

“ Are you her schoolmaster as well as her brother’s ? — Or 
perhaps you would like to be ? ” said Eugene. 

It was a stab that the blood followed, in its rush to Brad- 
ley Headstone’s face, as swiftly as if it had been dealt with a 
dagger. “ What do you mean by that ? ” was as much as he 
could utter. 

“ A natural ambition enough,” said Eugene, coolly. “ Far 
be it from me to say otherwise. The sister — who is some- 
thing too much upon your lips, perhaps — is so very different 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND, 


121 


from all the associations to which she has been used, and 
from all the low obscure people about her, that it is a very 
natural ambition.” 

‘^Do you throw my obscurity in my teeth, Mr. Wray- 
burn ? ” 

“ How I can reproach you with what is not within my 
knowledge, or how I can cast stones that were never in my 
hand, is a problem for the ingenuity of a schoolmaster to 
prove,” returned Eugene. Is that all ? ” 

‘‘No, sir. If you suppose that boy — ” 

“ Who really will be tired of waiting,” said Eugene. 

“ If you suppose that boy to be friendless, you deceive 
yourself. I am his friend, and you shall find me so.” 

“ And you will find him on the stairs,” remarked Eugene. 

“You may have promised yourself, sir, that you could do 
what you chose here, because you had to deal with a mere 
boy, inexperienced, friendless, and unassisted. But I give 
you warning that this mean calculation is wrong. Y ou have 
to do with a man also. You have to do with me. I will 
support him, and, if need be, require reparation for him. 
My hand and heart are in this cause, and are open to him.” 

“ And — quite a coincidence — the door is open,” remarked 
Eugene. 

“ I scorn your shifty evasions, and I scorn you,” said the 
schoolmaster. “ In the meanness of your nature you revile 
me with the meanness of my birth, I hold you in contempt 
for it.” 

With a consciously bad grace and stiff manner, as Wray- 
burn looked so easily and calmly on, he went out with these 
words, and the heavy door closed like a furnace-door u23on 
his red and white heats of rage. 

‘ A curious monomaniac,” said Eugene. “ The man seems 
to believe that everybody was acquainted with his mother !” 

Mortimer Lightwood being still at the window, to which 
he had in delicacy withdrawn, Eugene called to him, and he 
fell to slowly pacing the room. 

“ My dear fellow,” said Eugene, as he lighted another ci- 
gar, “ I fear my unexpected visitors have been troublesome. 
If as a set-off (excuse the legal phrase from a barrister-at- 
law) you would like to ask Tippins to tea. I jffedge myseK to 
make love to her.” 


122 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“Eugene, Eugene, Eugene,” replied Mortimer, “I am 
sorry for this. And to think that I have been so blind I ” 

“ How blind, dear boy ? ” inquired his unmoved friend. 

“ What were your words that night at the river-side pub- 
lic-house ? ” said Lightwood, stopping. “ What was it that 
you asked me ? Did I feel like a dark combination of traitor 
and pickpocket when I thought of that girl ? ” 

“ I seem to remember the expression,” said Eugene. 

“ How do you feel when you think of her just now ? ” 

His friend made no direct reply, but observed, after a few 
whiffs of his cigar, “ Don’t mistake the situation. There is 
no better girl in all this London than Lizzie Hexam. There 
is no better among my people at home ; no better among 
your people.” 

“ Granted. What follows ? ” 

“ There,” said Eugene, looking after him dubiously as he 
paced away to the other end of the room, “ you put me again 
upon guessing the riddle that I have given up.” 

“ Eugene, do you design to capture and desert tins girl ? ” 

“ My dear fellow, no.” 

“ Do you design to marry her ? ” 

“ My dear fellow, no.” 

“ Do you design to pursue her ? ” 

“ My dear fellow, I don’t design anything. I have no de- 
sign wTiat ever. I am incapable of designs. If I conceived 
a design, I should speedily abandon it, exhausted by the op- 
eration.” 

“ Are you in communication with this girl, and is what 
these people say true ? ” 

“ I concede both admissions to my honorable and learned 
friend.” 

“ Then what is to come of it ? W^hat are you doing ? 
Where are you going ? ” 

“ My dear Mortimer, one would think the schoolmaster 
had left behind him a catechising infection. Y on are ruffled 
by the want of another cigar. Take one of these, I entreat. 
Light it at mine, which is in perfect order. So! How do 
me the justice to believe I would answer your questions in- 
stantly if I could. But to enable me to do so, I must first 
have found out the troublesome conundrum long abandoi ed. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


123 


Here it is. Eugene Wray burn.” Tapping his forehead 
and breast. Riddle-me, riddle-me-ree, perhaps you can 
tell me what this may be ? — Hoj upon my life I can’t. I 
give it up ! ” 


CHAPTER XXL 


HE arrangement between Mr. Boffin and his literary 



X man^ Mr. Silas Wegg, so far altered with the altered 
habits of Mr. Boffin’s life, as that the Roman Empire usually 
declined in the morning, and in the eminently aristocratic 
family mansion, rather than in the evening, as of yore, and 
in Boffin’s Bower. There were occasions, however, when 
Mr. Boffin, seeking a brief refuge from the blandishments of 
fashion, would present himself at the Bower after dark, to 
anticipate the next sallying forth of Wegg, and would there, 
on the old settle, pursue the downward fortunes of those en- 
ervated and corrupted masters of the world, who were by 
this time on their last legs. 

Two or three diplomatic interviews, the result of great 
subtlety on Mr. Wegg’s part, had enabled him to complete 
his bargain with Mr. Venus. 

“ Bring me round to the Bower,” said Silas, when the bar- 
gain was closed, “next Saturday evening, and if a sociable 
glass of old J amaikey warm should meet your views, I am 
not the man to begrudge it.” 

Saturday evening is come, and Mr. Venus. 

“ Here is your purchase, Mr. W egg,” says V enus, politely 
handing it over, “ and I am glad to restore it to the source 
from which it — flowed.” 

“ Thankee,” says Wegg. 

In Mr. Wegg’s sitting-room, made bright on the chilly 
evening by gaslight and fire, Mr. V enus softens, and com- 
pliments him on his abode ; profiting by the occasion to re- 
mind Wegg that he (Venus) told him he had got into a good 
thing. 

“ Tolerable,” W egg rejoins. “ But bear in mind, Mr. V e- 
nus, that there’s no gold without its alloy. Mix for yourself 
and take a seat in the chimbley-corner.” 

“ And there’s alloy even in this metal of yours, Mr. 



124 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Mystery,” returns Wegg. “ I don’t like it, Mr. Yenus. 
I don’t like to have the life knocked out of former inhabit- 
ants of this house, in the gloomy dark, and not know who 
did it.” 

Might you have any suspicions, Mr. W egg ? ” 

No,” returns that gentleman. “ I know who profits by 
it. But I’ve no suspicions. Here is an immense fortune 
drops from the clouds upon a person that shall be nameless. 
Here is a weekly allowance, with a certain weight of coals, 
drops from the clouds upon me. Which of us is the better 
man? Not the person who shall be nameless. That’s an 
observation of mine, but I don’t make it an objection. I 
take my allowance and my certain weight of coals. He 
takes his fortune. That’s the way it works. Again look 
here,” pursues Silas, “ here’s another observation, Mr. Ye- 
nus, unaccompanied with an objection. Him that shall be 
nameless is liable to be talked over. He gets talked over. 
Him that shall be nameless, having me at his right hand, 
naturally looking to be promoted higher, and you may per- 
haps say meriting to be promoted higher — ” 

(Mr. Yenus murmurs that he does say so.) 

“ Him that shall be nameless, under such circumstances, 
passes me by, and puts a talking-over stranger above my 
head. Which of us two is the better man ? Which of us 
two can repeat most poetry ? Which of us two has, in the 
service of him that shall be nameless, tackled the Romans, 
both civil and military, till he has got as husky as if he’d been 
weaned and ever since brought up on sawdust? Not the 
talking-over stranger. Yet the house is as free to him as if 
it was his, and he has his room, and is put upon a footing, and 
draws about a thousand a year. I am banished to the Bow- 
er, to be found in it like a piece of furniture whenever want- 
ed. Merit, therefore, don’t win. That’s the way it works. 
I observe it, because I can’t help observing it, being accus- 
tomed to take a powerful sight of notice ; but I don’t object. 
Ever here before, Mr. Yenus ? ” 

“ Not inside the gate, Mr. Wegg.” 

We were talking of old Mr. Harmon being a friend of 
yours.” 

‘‘ Not a friend, Mr. Wegg. Only known to speak to, ai d 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


125 


to have a little deal with now and then. A very inquisitive 

character, regarding what was found in the dust.” 

Did you ever hear him mention,” returns Wegg, “ how 
he found it, my dear friend ? Living on the mysterious 
premises, one would like to know. For instance, where he 
found things? Or, for instance, how he set about it? 
Whether he began at the top of the mounds, or whether he 
began at the bottom. Whether he prodded ; or whether he 
scooped ? Should you say scooped, my dear Mr. Y enus ; or 
should you — as a man — say prodded ? ” 

I should say neither, Mr. Wegg. Because I suppose, sir, 
that what was found, was found in the sorting and sifting.” 

Living (as I said before) on the mysterious premises,” 
says Wegg, “ one likes to know. Would you be inclined to 
say now — as a brother — that he ever hid things in the dust, 
as well as f o und ’ em ? ” 

Mr. Wegg, on the whole, I should say he might.” 

Mr. W egg claps on his spectacles, and admiringly surveys 
Mr. Y enus from head to foot. 

“ As a mortal equally with myself, I take your hand in 
mine for the first time this day, and, sir, I now propose a 
friendly move. If there is anything to be found on these 
})remises, let us find it together. Let us make the friendly 
move of agreeing to look for it together. Let us make the 
friendly move of agreeing to share the profits of it equally 
betwixt us. In the cause of the right.” Thus Silas, assum- 
ing a noble air. 

The articles of the friendly move are then severally recited 
and agreed upon. They are but secrecy, fidelity, and perse- 
verance. The Bower to be always free of access to Mr. Y e- 
nus for his researches, and every precaution to be taken 
against their attracting observation in the neighborhood. 

There’s a footstep ! ” exclaims Yenus. 

“ Where ? ” cries Wegg, starting. 

‘^Outside. St!” 

It approaches the window, and a hand taps at the glass. 
‘‘ Come in I ” calls Wegg ; meaning come round by the door. 
But the heavy old-fashioned sash is slowly raised, and a 
head slowly looks in out of the dark background of the night. 

“ Pray is Mr. Silas Wegg here ? Oh 1 I see him 1 Good 


126 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


evening’^ Mr. Wegg. The yard gate-lock should he looked 
to, if you please ; it doesn’t catch.” 

Is it Mr. Kokesmith ? ” falters Wegg. 

“ It is Mr. Rokesmith. Don’t let me disturb you. I am 
not coming in. I have only a message for you, which I un- 
dertook to deliver on my way home to my lodgings. Mr. 
Boffin wishes you to know that he does not expect you to 
stay at home any evening, on the chance of his coming. It 
has occurred to him that he may, without intending it, have 
been a tie upon you. In future, if he should come without 
notice, he will take his chance of finding you, and it will be 
all the same to him if he does not.” 

With that, and “ Grood-night,” the Secretary lowers the 
window, and disappears. 

“And for that individual, Mr. Yenus,” remarks ^Yegg, 
when he is fully gone, “ I have been passed over ! Let me 
ask you what you think of him ? ” 

Mr. Y enus thinks he has “ a singular look.” 

“A double look, you mean, sir,” rejoins Wegg, playing 
bitterly upon the word. “ That’s his look. Any amount of 
singular look for me, but not a double look ! That’s an un- 
derhanded mind, sir. Remembrances of Our House, of 
Master G-eorge, of Aunt Jane, of Uncle Parker, all laid 
waste ! All offered up sacrifices to the minion of fortune 
and the worm of the hour ! ” 


CHAPTER XXII. 



iHE minion of fortune and the worm of the hour, or in 


X less cutting language^ Xicodemus Boffin, Esquire, the 
Golden Dustman, had become as much at home in his emi- 
nently aristocratic family mansion as he was likely ever to 
be. He could not but feel that, like an eminently aristocrat- 
ic family cheese, it was much too large for his wants, and 
bred an infinite amount of parasites ; but he was content to 
regard this drawback on his property as a sort of perpetual 
Legacy Duty. He felt the more resigned to it, forasmuch as 
Mrs. Boffin enjoyed herself completely, and Miss Bella was 
delighted. 

That young lady was, no doubt, an acquisition to the Bcf- 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


127 


fins. She was far too pretty to be unattractive anywhere, 
and far too quick of perception to be below the tone of her 
new career. Whether it improved her heart might be a 
matter of taste that was open to question ; but as touching 
another matter of taste, its improvement of her appearance 
and manner, there could be no question whatever. 

An invaluable man is Rokesmith,” said Mr.^ Boffin, after 
two or three months. “ But I can’t quite make him out.” 

Neither could Bella, so she found the subject rather inter- 
esting. 

He takes more care of my affairs, morning, noon, and 
night,” said Mr. Boffin, than fifty other men put together 
either could or would ; and yet he has ways of his own that 
are like tying a scaffolding-pole right across the road, and 
bringing me up short when I am almost a-walking arm-in- 
arm with him.” 

May I ask how so, sir ? ” inquired Bella. 

“Well, my dear,” said Mr. Boffin, “he won’t meet any 
company here, but you. When we have visitors, I should 
wish him to have his regular place at the table like ourselves ,* 
but no, he won’t take it.” 

“ If he considers himself above it,” said Miss Bella, with 
an airy toss of her head, “ I should leave him alone.” 

“It ain’t that, my dear,” replied Mr. Boffin, thinking it 
over. “ He don’t consider himself above it.” 

“Perhaps he considers himself beneath it,” suggested 
Bella. “ If so, he ought to know best.” 

“No, my dear ; nor it ain’t that, neither. No,” repeated 
Mr. Boffin, “ Rokesmith’s a modest man, but he don’t con- 
sider himself beneath it.” 

“ Then what does he consider, sir ? ” asked Bella. 

“ Dashed if I know ! ” said Mr. Boffin. “ It seemed at 
first as if it was only Lightwood that he objected to meet. 
And now it seems to be everybody,, except you.” 

“Oho!” thought Miss Bella. “Indeed! That's it, is 
it ! ” For Mr. Mortimer Lightwood had dined there two or 
three times, and she had met him elsewhere, and he had 
shown her some attention. “ Rather cool in a Secretary — 
and Pa’s lodger — to make me the subject of his jealousy ! ” 

That Pa’s daughter should be so contemptuous of Pa’s 


128 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


lodger was odd ; but there were odder anomalies than that 
in the mind of the spoiled girl : the doubly spoiled girl : 
spoiled first by poverty, and then by wealth. 

Y et it was not so very long ago that Bella had been flut- 
tered by the discovery that this same Secretary and lodger 
seemed to like her. Ah! but the eminently aristocratic 
mansion and Mrs. Boffin’s dressmaker had not come into 
play then. 

“ You never charge me, Miss Wilfer,” said the Secretary, 
encountering her by chance alone in the great drawing- 
room, “ with commissions for home. I shall always be hap- 
py to execute any commands you may have in that direc- 
tion.” 

Pray what may you mean, Mr. Rokesmith? ” inquired 
Miss Bella, with languidly drooping eyelids. 

By home ? I mean your father’s house at Holloway.” 

She colored under the retort — so skillfully thrust that the 
words seemed to be merely a plain answer, in plain good 
faith — and said, rather more emphatically and sharply : 

What commissions and commands are you speaking 
of?” 

“ Only such little words of remembrance as I assume you 
send somehow or other,” replied the Secretary with his for- 
mer air. “ It would be a pleasure to me if you would make 
me the bearer of them.” 

“ I am going, sir,” said Bella, looking at him as if he had 
reproved her, “ to see them to-morrow.” 

“ Is that,” he asked, hesitating, said to me, or to them ? ” 

“ To which you please.” 

To both ? Shall I make it a message ? ” 

‘‘You can if you like, Mr. Rokesmith. Message or no 
message, I am going to see them to-morrow.” 

“ Then I will tell them so.” 

He lingered a moment, as though to give her the oppor- 
tunity of prolonging the conversation if she wished. As 
she remained silent, he left her. Two incidents of the little 
interview were felt by Miss Bella herself, when alone again, 
to be very curious. The first was, that he unquestionably left 
her with a penitent air upon her, and a penitent feeling in 
her heart. The second was, that she had not had an 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


129 


intention or a thought of going home, until she had an- 
nounced it to him as a settled design. 

“ What can I mean by it, or what can he mean by it? ” 
was her mental inquiry : “ He has no right to any power 
over me, and how do I come to mind him when I don’t care 
for him? ” 

Mrs. Boffin insisting that Bella should make to-morrow’s 
expedition in the chariot, she went home in great grandeur. 

The day was passing in the usual uncomfortable fashion 
when the front garden-gate clanked, and the Secretary Avas 
seen coming at a brisk pace up the steps. “ Leave Me to 
open the door to him,” said Mrs Wilfer, rising Avith stately 
resignation as she shook her head and dried her eyes ; “ we 
have at present no stipendiary girl to do so. W e have noth- 
ing to conceal. If he sees traces of emotion on our cheeks, 
let him construe them as he may.” 

With those Avords she stalked out. In a feAv moments 
she stalked in again, proclaiming in her heraldic manner, 
“ Mr. Rokesmith is the bearer of a packet for Miss Bella 
Wilfer.” 

Mr. Rokesmith folloAved close upon his name, and of 
course saw what Avas amiss. But he discreetly afccted to 
see nothing, and addressed Miss Bella. 

“ Mr. Boffin intended to have placed this in the carriage 
for you this morning.” 

Bella took it in her hand, and thanked him. 

“ We have been quarreling here a little, Mr. Rokesmith, 
but not more than Ave used ; you know our agreeable ways 
among ourselves. You find me just going. Good-bye, 
mamma, Good-bye, Lavvy ! ” And with a kiss for each 
Miss Bella turned to the door. 

When Bella was seated in the carriage, she opened the 
little packet in her hand. It contained a pretty purse, and 
the purse contained a bank note for fifty pounds. “ This 
shall be a joyful surprise for poor dear Pa,” said Bella, “ and 
I’ll take it myself into the City ! ” 

Near Mincing Lane she dispatched the male domestic of 
Mrs. Boffin,” in search of the counting-house of Chicksey, 
V eneering, and Stobbles, AAfith a message importing that if R, 
Wilfer could come out, there was a lady waiting who would 
9 


130 


COJSDEJSSED CLASSICS. 


be glad to speak with him. The delivery of these mysterious 
words from the mouth of a footman caused so great an ex- 
citement in the counting-house, that a youthful scout was 
instantly appointed to follow him, observe the lady, and 
come in with his report. Nor was the agitation by any 
means diminished, when the scout rushed back with the in- 
telligence that the lady was “ a slap-up gal in a bang-up 
chariot.” 

The Cherub with his pen behind his ear under his rusty 
hat, arrived at the carriage-door in a breatliless condition. 

My dear child ! ” he panted, incoherently. Grood gra- 
cious me ! What a lovely woman you are ! I thought you 
had been unkind and forgotten your mother and sister.” 

“ I have just been to see them, Pa dear.” 

“ Oh ! and how — how did you find your mother ? ” asked 
E. W., dubiously. 

“Very disagreeable. Pa, and so was Lavvy. I was dis- 
agreeable too, Pa ; we were all of us disagreeable together. 
But I want you to come and dine with me somewhere. Pa. 
Do, I beg and pray, get leave for the rest of the day, and 
come and pass it with me ! ” 

“ Well, my dear. I’ll cut back and ask for leave.” 

Back came her father, more like a boy than ever, in his re- 
lease from school. “ All right, my dear. Leave given at 
once. Eeally very handsomely done ! ” 

“ Noav find some quiet place. Pa, in which I can wait for 
you, while you go an errand for me after I send the car- 
riage away, and ask no questions. You take this purse; 
you go to the nearest place where they keep everything of 
the very very best, ready made ; you buy and put on the 
most beautiful suit of clothes, the most beautiful hat, and 
the most beautiful pair of bright boots (patent leather. Pa, 
mind ! ) that are to be got for money ; and you come back 
to me.” 

After half an hour, he came back, so brilliantly transform- 
ed that Bella was obliged to walk round him in ecstatic ad- 
miration twenty times, before she could draw her arm 
through his, and delightedly squeeze it. 

“Now, Pa,” said Bella, hugging him close, “take this 
lovely woman out to dinner.” 


OUB MUTUAL FBIEND. 


131 


“ Where shall we go, my dear ? ” 

GrreeiiAvich ! ” said Bella, valiantly. And be sure you 
treat this lovely woman with everything of the best.” 

“ Now, all the rest of this. Pa,” said Bella after dinner roll- 
ing up the purse, hammering it small with her little fist on 
the table, and cramming it into one of the pockets of his new 
waistcoat, “is for you, to buy presents with for them at 
home, and to pay bills with, and to divide as you like, and 
spend exactly as you think proper.” 

Arrived at Mr. Boffin’s door, Bella set him with his back 
against it, tenderly took him by the ears as convenient hand- 
les for her purpose, and kissed him until he knocked muf- 
fled knocks at the door with the back of his head. That 
done, she gayly parted from him. 

Not so gayly, however, but that tears filled her eyes as he 
went away down the dark street. Not so gayly, but that 
she several times said, “ Ah, poor little Pa ! Ah, poor dear 
struggling shabby little Pa ! ” before she took heart to knock 
at the door. Not so gayly, but that the brilliant furniture 
seemed to stare her out of countenance as if it insisted on be- 
ing compared with the dingy furniture at home. Not so 
gayly, but that she fell into very low spirits sitting late in her 
own room, and very heartily wept, as she wished, now that 
the deceased old John Harmon had never made a will about 
her, now that the deceased young John Harmon had lived to 
marry her. “ Contradictory things to wish,” said Bella, 
“ but my life and fortunes are so contradictory altogether 
that what can I expect myself to be ! ” 

CHAPTEE XXIII. 

T he Secretary, next morning, was informed that a 
youth waited in the hall who gave the name of Sloppy. 
Mr. Sloppy being introduced, remained close to the door : 
revealing in various parts of his form many surprising, con- 
founding, and incomprehensible buttons. 

“I am glad to see you,” said John Eokesmith, “I have 
been expecting you.” 

Sloppy explained that he had meant to come before, but 
that the Orphan (of whom he made mention as Our Johnny) 
had been ailing,, and he liad waited to report him well 


132 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Then he is well now ? ” said the Secretary. 

ISTo he ain’t,’’ said Sloppy. Must have took ’em from 
the Minders — them that come out upon him, and par tickler 
his chest.” 

This is unfortunate,” said Rokesmith. “ I must go and 
break it to Mrs. Boffin.” 

“Ah, my poor dear pretty little John Harmon!” ex- 
claimed Mrs. Boffin. “ You don’t think he is in a very, very 
bad way, do you ? ” 

Put upon his good faith, and finding it in collision with 
his inclinations. Sloppy threw back his head and uttered a 
mellifluous howl, rounded off with a sniff. 

“ So bad as that I ” cried Mrs. Boffin. “ It’s not a right 
place for the poor child to stay in. Tell us, dear Mr. Roke- 
smith, what to do for the best.” 

He had already thought what to do, and the consultation 
was very short. He could pave the way, he said, in half an 
hour, and then they would go down to Brentford. “ Pray 
take me,” said Bella. Therefore a carriage was ordered, of 
capacity to take them all. 

On the way down, they stopped at a toy-shop, and bought 
a noble charger, a description of whose points and trappings 
had on the last occasion conciliated the then worldly-minded 
orphan, and also a Noah’s ark, and also a yellow bird with an 
artificial voice in him, and also a military doll so well dressed 
that if he had only been of life-size his brother-officers in the 
Gruards might never have found him out. Bearing these 
gifts, they raised the latch of Betty Higden’s door, and saw 
her sitting in the dimmest and furthest corner with poor 
Johnny in her lap. 

“ And how’s my boy, Betty ? ” asked Mrs. Boffin, sitting 
down beside her. 

“He’s bad! He’s bad!” said Betty. “I begin to be 
afeerd he’ll not be yours any more than mine. All others 
belonging to him have gone to the Power and the Glory, and 
I have a mind that they’re drawing him to them — leading 
him away.” 

“ No, no, no,” said Mrs. Boffin. “ Is he asleep ? ” 

“ No, I think not. You’re not asleep, my Johnny ? ” 

“ No,” said Johnny, with a quiet air of pity for himself, 
and without opening his eyes. 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND, 


133 


** Here’s the lady, J ohnny, and the horse.” 

Johnny could bear the lady with complete indifference, 
but not the horse. Opening his heavy eyes, he slowly broke 
into a smile on beholding that splendid phenomenon, and 
wanted to take it in his arms. As it was much too big, it 
was put upon a chair where he could hold it by the mane 
and contemplate it Which he sooji forgot to do. 

But Johnny murmured something with his eyes closed, 
and old Betty bent her ear to listen. The murmur was, 
‘‘ Who is the boofer lady ? ” Now, the boofer, or beautiful, 
lady was Bella ; and whereas this notice from the poor baby 
would have touched her of itself, it was rendered more 
pathetic by the late melting of her heart to her poor little 
father, and their joke about the lovely woman. So Bella’s 
behavior was very tender and very natural when she 
kneeled on the brick floor to clasp the child, and when the 
child, with a child’s admiration of what is young and pretty, 
fondled the boofer lady. 

Now, my good dear Betty,” said Mrs. Boffin, hoping 
that she saw her opportunity, and laying her hand persua- 
sively on her arm ; we have come to remove J ohnny from 
this cottage to where he can be taken better care of.” 

Instantly, and before another word could be spoken, the 
old woman started up with blazing eyes, and rushed at the 
door with the sick child. 

“ Stand away from me, every one of ye ! ” she cried out 
wildly. “ I see what ye mean, now. Let me go my way, 
all of ye. I’d sooner kill the Pretty, and kill myself ! ” 

Catching sight of Mrs. Boffin’s wholesome face, she re- 
lented, and crouching down by the door and bending over 
her burden to hush it, said humbly : Maybe my fears has 
put me wrong. If they have so, tell me, and the good Lord 
forgive me ! I’m quick to take this fright, I know, and my 
head is summ’at light with wearying and watching.” 

“ There, there, there ! ” returned Mrs. Boffin. Come, 
come ! Say no more of it, Betty. It was a mistake, a mis- 
take. Any one of us might have made it in your place, and 
felt just as you do.” 

The Lord bless ye 1 ” said the old woman. 

^‘Now, see, Betty,” pursued the sweet compassionate 


134 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


soul, “ what I really did mean, and what I should have begun 
by saying out, if I had only been a little wiser and handier. 
We want to move Johnny to a place where there are none 
but children ; a place set up on purpose for sick children ; 
where the good doctors and nurses pass their lives with 
children, talk to none but children, touch none but children, 
comfort and cure nonel^ut children.” 

“ Is there really such a place ? ” 

‘‘Yes, Betty, on my word, and you shall see it. If my 
home was a better place for the dear boy, I’d take him to it ; 
but indeed indeed it’s not.” 

“ You shall take him,” returned Betty, “ where you will, 
my deary. I am not so hard, but that I believe your face 
and voice, and I will, as long as I can see and hear.” 

This victory gained, Eokesmith made haste to profit by 
it, for he saw how wofully time had been lost. 

At the Children’s Hospital, the gallant steed, the Noah’s 
ark, the yellow bird, and the officer in the Guards, were 
made as welcome as their child-owner. 

They were all carried up into a fresh airy room, and there 
Johnny came to himself, out of a sleep or a swoon or what- 
ever it was, to find himself lying in a little quiet bed, with a 
little platform over his breast, on which were already ar- 
ranged, to give him heart and urge him to cheer up, the 
Noah’s ark, the noble steed, and the yellow bird ; with the 
officer in the Guards doing duty over the wffiole, quite as 
much to the satisfaction of his country as if he had been 
upon Parade. And at the bed’s head wms a colored picture 
beautiful to see, representing as it were another Johnny 
seated on the knee of some Angel surely who loved httle 
children. 

A very little brother lying in the next bed with a broken 
leg, w^as so enchanted by this spectacle that his delight ex- 
alted its enthralling interest ; and so came rest and sleep. 

“ I see you are not afraid to leave the dear child here, Bet- 
ty,” wdiispered Mrs. Boffin. 

“No, ma’am. Most willingly, most thankfully, with all 
my heart and soul.” 

So, they kissed him, and left him there, and old Betty was 
to come back early in the morning, and nobody but Poke- 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


135 


smitli knew for certain how that the doctor had said, 
This should have been days ago. Too late ! ” 

But, Rokesmith knowing it, and knowing that his bearing 
it in mind would be acceptable thereafter to that good wo- 
man who had been the only light in the childhood of deso- 
late John Harmon dead and gone, resolved that late at night 
he would go back to the bedside of John Harmon’s name- 
sake, and see how it fared with him. 

The family whom God had brought together were not all 
asleep, but were all quiet. From bed to bed, a light woman- 
ly tread and a pleasant fresh face passed in the silence of the 
night. A little head would lift itself up into the softened 
light here and there, to be kissed as the face went by — for 
these little patients are very loviilg — and would then submit 
itself to be composed to rest again. The mite with the bro- 
ken leg was restless, and moaned ; but after a while turned 
his face towards Johnny’s bed, to fortify himself with a 
view of the ark, and fell asleep. Over most of the beds, the 
toys were yet grouped as the children had left them when 
they last laid themselves down, and in their innocent gro- 
tesc{ueness and incongruity, they might have stood for the 
children’s dreams. 

The doctor came in too, to see how it fared with Johnny. 
And he and Rokesmith stood together, looking down with 
compassion on him. 

What is it, Johnny ? ” Rokesmith was the questioner, 
and put an arm round the poor baby as he made a struggle. 

Him ! •” said the little fellow. Those ! ” 

The doctor was quick to understand children, and, taking 
the horse, the ark, the yellow bird, and the man in the 
Guards, from Johnny’s bed, softly placed them on that of his 
next neighbor, the mite with the broken leg. 

With a weary and yet a pleased smile, and with an action 
as if he stretched his little figure out to rest, the child heaved 
his body on the sustaining arm, and seeking Rokesmith’s 
face with his lips, said : 

A kiss for the boofer lady.” 

Having now bequeathed all he had to dispose of, and 
arranged his affairs in this world, Johnny, thus speaking, 
left it. 


136 


CONDENSED CLjLSSICS. 


CHAPTER XXIY. 

N ot long afterward Mrs. Boffin called together her hus- 
band, Bella, and the Secretary, for a consultation. 

“ What I want to talk about,” said she, “ is this. Mr. and 
Mrs. Milvey have sent me the kindest note possible, offering 
to find me another little child to name and educate and bring 
up. W ell. This has set me thinking.” 

(“ And she is a steam-ingein at it,” murmured Mr. Boffin.) 
“ — This has set me thinking, I say,” repeated Mrs. Boffin, 
cordially beaming under the influence of her husband’s com- 
pliment, “ and I have thought two things. First of all, that 
I have grown timid of reviving John Harmon’s name. It’s 
an unfortunate name, and I fancy I should reproach myself 
if I gave it to another dear child, and it proved again un- 
lucky.” 

“ Xow, whether,” said Mr. Boffin, gravely propounding 
case for his Secretary’s opinion ; “ whether one might call 
that a superstition ? ” 

“It is a matter of feeling with Mrs. Boffin,” said Roke- 
smith, gently. “ The name has always been unfortunate. 
It has now this new unfortunate association connected with 
it. The name has died out. Why revive it ? Might I ask 
Miss Wiffer what she thinks ? ” 

“ It has not been a fortunate name for me,” said Bella, col- 
oring — “ or at leavSt it was not, until it led to my being here 
— but that is not the point in my thoughts. As we had 
given the name to the poor child, and as the poor child took 
so lovingly to me, I think I should feel jealous of calling an- 
other child by it. I think I should feel as if the name had 
become endeared to me, and I had no right to use it so.” 

“ And that’s your opinion ? ” remarked Mr. Boffin, observ- 
ant of the Secretary’s face and again addressing him. 

“ I say again, it is a matter of feeling,” returned the Secre- 
tary. “I think Miss Wilfer’s feeling very womanly and 
pretty.” 

“ Now, give us your opinion. Noddy,” said Mrs. Boffin. 

“ My opinion, old lady, is your opinion.” 

“ Then,” said Mrs. Boffin, “ we agree not to revive John 
Harmon’s name ; we have done with it.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


137 


“ Laid it up as a remembrance,” suggested Bella. 

“ Much better said, my dear ; laid it up as a remembrance. 
Well then ; I have been thinking if I take any orphan to pro- 
vide for, let it not be a pet and a plaything for me, but a 
creature to be helped for its own sake.” 

“Not pretty then ? ” said Bella. 

“No,” returned Mrs. Boffin, stoutly. 

“ Nor prepossessing then ? ” said Bella. 

“ No,” returned Mrs. Boffin. “ Not necessarily so. That’s 
as it may happen. A well-disposed boy comes in my way 
who may be even a little wanting in such advantages for 
getting on in life, but is honest and industrious and requires 
a helping hand and deserves it. If I am very much in earnest 
and determined to be unselfish, let me take care of him.” 

Here the footman appeared, and apologetically announced 
Sloppy. 

The Council looked at one another, and paused. “ Shall 
he be brought here, ma’am ? ” asked Eokesmith. 

“ Yes,” said Mrs. Boffin. 

The consideration of Mrs. Boffin had clothed Mr. Sloppy 
in a suit of black, on which the tailor had received personal 
directions from Rokesmith to expend the utmost cunning of 
his art, with a view to the concealment of the cohering and 
sustaining buttons. But so much more powerful were the 
frailties of Sloppy’s form than the strongest resources of 
tailoring science, that he now stood before the Council, a 
perfect Argus in the way of buttons. 

“ And how is Betty, my good fellow ? ” said Mrs. Boffin. 

“ Thankee, mum,” said Sloppy, “ she do pretty nicely, 
and sending her dooty and many thanks for the tea and all 
faviours and wishing to know the family’s healths.” 

“ Have you just come, Sloppy ? ” 

“ Yes, mum.” 

“ Then you have not had your dinner yet ? ” 

“ No, mum. But I mean to it. For I ain’t forgotten your 
handsome orders that I was never to go away without hav- 
ing had a good ’un off of meat and beer and pudding — no : 
there was four of ’em, for I reckoned ’em up when I had 
’em ; meat one, beer two, vegetables three, and which was 
four ? — Why pudding, he was four ! ” Here Sloppy threw 


138 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


his head hack, opened his mouth wide, and laughed raptur- 
ously. 

“ How are the poor little Minders ? ” asked Mrs. Boffin. 

“ Striking right out, mum, and coming round beautiful.” 

Mrs. Boffin looked on the other three members of Coun- 
cil, and then said, beckoning with her finger : 

“ Sloppy.” 

Yes, mum.” 

“ Should you like to be always taken care of here, if you 
were industrious and deserving ? ” 

Oh, mum ! — But there’s Mrs. Higden,” said Sloppy, 
checking himself in his raptures, drawing back, and shaking 
his head with very serious meaning. “ There’s Mrs. Hig- 
den. Mrs. Higden goes before all. None can ever be bet- 
ter friends to me than Mrs. Higden’s been. And she must 
be turned for, must Mrs. Higden. Where would Mrs. Hig- 
den be if she warn’t turned for ? ” 

^ W^ou are as right as right can be. Sloppy,” said Mrs. Bof- 
fin, and far be it from me to tell you otherwise. It shall be 
seen to. If Betty Higden can be turned for all the same, 
you shall come here and be taken care of for life, and be 
made able to keep her in other ways than the turning.” 

That he might have room enough for his feelings, Sloppy 
threw back his head, opened his mouth wide, and uttered a 
dismal howl. 


CHAPTER XXY. 


OVE at first sight is a trite expression quite sufficiently 



discussed ; enough that in certain smouldering natures 
like Bradley Headstone’s, that passion leaps into a blaze, 
and makes such head as fire does in a rage of wind, when 
other passions, but for its mastery, could be held in chains. 

One evening he went his Avay toward the dolls’ dressmak- 
er’s, brooding and brooding, and a sense of being vanquished 
in a struggle might haA^e been pieced out of his AAmrried.face. 
Truly, in his breast there lingered a resentful shame to find 
himself defeated by this passion for Charley Hexam’s sister, 
though in the very self-same moments he Avas concentrating 
himself upon the object of bringing the passion to a suo^ess- 
f ul issue. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


139 


He appeared before the dolls’ dressmaker, sitting alone at 
her work. Oho ! ” thought that sharp young personage, 
“ it’s you, is it ? I know your tricks and your manners, my 
friend ! ’’ 

Lizzie Hexam arriving soon after showed some surprise 
on seeing Bradley Headstone there. r, 

‘‘Here’s a perfectly disinterested person, Lizzie dear,” 
said the knowing Miss Wren, “ come to talk with you, for 
your own sake and your brother’s. Think of that. I am 
sure there ought to be no third party present at anything so 
very kind and so very serious ; and so, if you’ll remove third 
party up-stairs, my dear, the third party will retire.” 

“ She can do no better than stay Avhere she is,” returned 
Lizzie, laying her hand lightly on Miss Jenny’s curls. And 
then to Bradley : “ From Charley, sir ? ” 

In an irresolute Avay, and stealing a clumsy look at her, 
Bradley rose to place a chair for her, and then returned to his 
own. 

“ Strictly speaking,” said he, “I come from Charley, be- 
cause I left him only a little while ago ; but I am not com- 
missioned by Charley. I come of my own spontaneous act. 
The fact is, the truth is, that Charley, having no secrets from 
me (to the best of my belief), has confided the whole of this 
matter to me.” 

He came to a stop, and Lizzie asked : “ What matter, sir ? ” 

“I thought,” returned the schoolmaster, “ that it might 
be so superfluous as to be almost impertinent, to enter upon 
a definition of it. My allusion was to this matter of your 
having put aside your brother’s plans for you, and given the 
preference to those of Mr. — I believe tlie name is Mr. Eu- 
gene Wrayburn.” 

Nothing being said on the other side, he had to begin 
again, and began with new embarrassment. 

“Your brother’s plans were communicated to me when 
he first had them in his thoughts. In point of fact he spoke 
to me about them when I was last here — when we were 
walking back together, and when I— when the impression 
was fresh upon me of having seen his sister. I approved of 
his idea, both because your brother ought naturally to be the 
originator of any such scheme, and because I hoped to be 


140 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


able to promote it. I should have had inexpressible pleas- 
ure, I should have taken inexpressible interest, in promoting 
it. Therefore I must acknowledge that when your brother 
was disappointed, I too was disappointed. I wish to avoid 
reservation or concealment, and I fully acknowledge that.” 

He appeared to have encouraged himself by having got so 
tar. At all events he went on with much greater firmness 
and force of erdphasis : though with a curious disposition to 
set his teeth, and with a curious tight-screwing movement 
of his right hand in the clenching palm of his left, like the ac- 
tion of one who was being physically hurt, and was unwil- 
ling to cry out. 

“ Y our brother has taken the matter so much to heart that 
he has remonstrated (in my presence he remonstrated) with 
Mr. Eugene Wray burn, if that be the name. He did so 
quite ineffectually ; as any one not blinded to the real char- 
acter of Mr. — Mr. Eugene Wray burn — would readily sup- 
pose.” 

He looked at Lizzie again, and held the look. And his 
face turned from burning red to white, and from white back 
to burning red, and so for the time to lasting deadly white. 

Finally, I resolved to come here alone, and appeal to you, 
and entreat you to retract the course you have chosen, and 
instead of confiding in a mere stranger — a person of most in- 
solent behavior to your brother and others — to prefer your 
brother and your brother’s friend.” 

Lizzie Hexam had changed color when those changes 
came over him, and her face now expressed some anger, 
more dislike, and even a touch of fear. But she answered 
him very steadily. 

‘‘ I cannot doubt, Mr. Headstone, that your visit is well 
meant. You have been so good a friend to Charley that I 
have no right to doubt it. I have nothing to tell Charley, 
but that I accepted the help to which he so much objects be- 
fore he made any plans for me ; or certainly before I knew' 
of any. It was considerately and delicately offered, and 
there were reasons that had weight with me which should 
be as dear to Charley as to me. I have no more to say to 
Charley on this subject.” 

His lips trembled and stood apart, as he followed this re- 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEXD. 


141 


pudiation of himself, and limitation of her words to her 
brother. 

“ I should have told Charley, if he had come to me,” she 
resumed, as though it were an after-thought, “that Jenny 
and I find our teacher very able and very patient, and that 
she takes great pains with us. So much so, that we have 
said to her we hope in a very little while to be able to go on 
by ourselves.” 

“ I should like to ask you,” said Bradley Headstone, 
grinding his words slowly out, as though they came from a 
rusty mill ; “ I should like to ask you, if I may without of- 
fense, whether you would have objected — no; rather, I 
should like to say, if I may without oftense, that I wish I had 
had the opportunity of coming here with your brother and 
devoting my poor abilities and experience to your service.” 

“ Thank you, Mr. Headstone.” 

“ But I fear,” he pursued, after a pause, furtively wrench- 
ing at the seat of his chair with one hand, as if he would have 
wrenched the chair to pieces, and gloomily observing her 
while her eyes were cast down, “that my humble services 
would not have found much favor with you ? ” 

She made no reply, and the poor stricken wretch sat con- 
tending with himself in a heat of passion and torment. Aft- 
er a while he took out his handkerchief and wiped his fore- 
head and hands. 

“ There is only one thing more I had to say, but it is the 
most important. There is a reason against this matter, there 
is a personal relation concerned in this matter, not yet ex- 
plained to you. It might — I don’t say it would — it might— 
induce you to think differently. To proceed under the pres- 
ent circumstances is out of the question. Will you please 
come to the understanding that there shall be another inter- 
view on the subject.” 

“ With Charley, Mr. Headstone ? ” 

“With — well,” he answered, breaking off, “yes! Say 
with him too. Will you please come to the understanding 
that there must be another interview under more favorable 
circumstances, before the whole case can be submitted ? ” 

“ I don’t,” said Lizzie, shaking her head, “ understand 
your meaning, Mr. Headstone.” 


142 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Limit my meaning for the present,” he interrupted, “ to 
the whole case being submitted in another interview.” 

What case, Mr. Headstone ? What is wanting to it ? ” 
“You — you shall be informed in the other interview.” 
Then he said, as if in a burst of irrepressible despair, “ I — I 
leave it all incomplete ! There is a spell upon me, I think ! ” 
And then added, almost as if he asked for pity, “ Grood- 
night ! ” 

He held out his hand. As she, with manifest hesitation, 
not to say reluctance, touched it, a strange tremble passed 
over him, and his face, so deadly white, was moved as by a 
stroke of pain. Then he was gone. 

CHAPTER XXVI. 

E OGtUE RIDERHOOD dwelt deep and dark in Lime- 
i house Hole, and had it not been for the daughter whom 
he often mentioned, Mr. Riderhood might have found the 
Hole a mere grave as to any means it would yield him of get- 
ting a living. But Miss Pleasant Riderhood had some little 
position and connection in Limehouse Hole. Upon the 
smallest of small scales, she was an unlicensed pawnbroker, 
keeping what was popularly called a Leaving Shop, by lend- 
ing insignificant sums on insignificant articles of property 
deposited with her as security. 

She shared with most of the lady inhabitants of the Hole, 
the peculiarity that her hair was a ragged knot, constantly 
coming down behind, and that she never could enter upon 
any undertaking without first twisting it into place. On a 
cold windy evening, being newly come to the threshold to 
take a look out of doors, she was winding herself up with 
both hands after this fashion. 

It was a wretched little shop, with a roof that any man 
standing in it could touch with his hand ; yet in its ill-lighted 
window was displayed the inscription Seaman’s Boarding- 
House. 

Pleasant Riderhood stood at the door, when a man crossed 
the street quickly and stood close before her. 

“ Is your father at home ? ” said he. 

think he is,” returned Pleasant, dropping her arms; 
“come in.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


14S 


It was a tentative reply, tlie man having a seafaring ap- 
pearance. Her father was not at home, and Pleasant knew 
it. “ Take a seat by the fire ; men of your calling are always 
welcome here.” 

Thankee,” said the man. 

His manner was the manner of a sailor, and his hands 
were the hands of a sailor, except that they were smooth. 

“ Might you be looking for a Boarding-House ? ” Pleasant 
inquired. 

“ I don’t rightly know my plans yet,” returned the man. 

“ You ain‘ t looking for a Leaving Shop ? ” 

“No,” said the man. 

“No,” assented Pleasant, “you’ve got too much of an 
outfit on you for that. But if you should want either, this is 
both.” 

“ Ay, ay ! ” said the man, glancing round the place. “ I 
know. I’ve been here before.” 

“ What did you do here when you were here before ? ” 
asked Pleasant. “ For I don’t remember you.” 

“ It’s not at all likely you should. I only stood at the 
door, one night — on the lower step there — while a shipmate 
of mine looked in to speak to your father. I remember the 
place well.” Looking very curiously round it. 

“ Might that have been long ago ? ” 

“ Ay, a goodish bit ago. When I came off my last voy- 
age.” 

“ Then you have not been to sea lately ? ” 

“No. Been in the sick bay since then, and been employed 
ashore.” 

“ Then, to be sure, that accounts for your hands.” 

The man with a keen look, a quick smile, and a change of 
manner, caught her up. “You’re a good observer. Yes. 
That accounts for my hands.” 

The conversation had arrived at a crisis to justify Miss 
Pleasant’s haii- in tumbling down. It tumbled down accord- 
ingly, and she twisted it up, looking from under her bent 
forehead at the man. In taking stock of his familiarly worn 
rough-weather nautical clothes, piece by piece, she took 
stock of a formidable knife in a sheath at his waist ready to 
his hand, and of a whistle hanging round his neck, and of a 


144 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


short jagged knotted club with a loaded head that peeped 
out of a pocket of his loose outer jacket or frock. He sat 
quietly looking at her ; but, with these appendages partially 
revealing themselves, and with a quantity of bristling oak- 
um-colored head and whisker, he had a formidable appear- 
ance. 

“ To wile away the time till your father comes,” he said, — 
“ pray is there much robbing and murdering of seamen about 
the water-side now ? ” 

‘‘No,” said Pleasant. 

“ Any ? ” 

“ Complaints of that sort are sometimes made, about Pat- 
clifie and W apping, and up that way. But who knows how 
many are true ? ” 

“ To be sure. I’ll tell you why I ask,” pursued the visitor, 
looking up from the fire. “ I was once beset that way my- 
self, and left for dead.” 

“ No ? said Pleasant. “ Where did it happen ? ” 

“ It happened,” returned the man, Avith a ruminative air, 
as he drew his right hand across his chin, and dipped the 
other in the pocket of his rough outer coat, “ it happened 
someAvhere about here as I reckon. I don’t think it can 
have been a mile from here.” 

“ Were you drunk ? ” asked Pleasant. 

“ I was muddled, but not with fair drinking. I had not 
been drinking, you understand. A mouthful did it.” 

Pleasant, Avith a grave look, shook her head. “Fair trade 
is one thing,” said she, “ but that’s another. No one has a 
right to carry on AAuth Jack in that way.” 

“ The sentiment does you credit,” returned the man, with 
a grim smile ; and added in a mutter, “ the more so, as I be- 
lieve it’s not your father’s. — Yes, I had a bad time of it, that 
time. I lost everything, and had a sharp struggle for my 
life, Aveak as I Avas.” 

“ Did you get the parties punished ? ” asked Pleasant. 

“A tremendous punishment folloAA'ed,” said the man, 
more seriously ; “ but it was not of my bringing about.” 

“ Of whose then ? ” asked Pleasant. 

The man pointed upAvard with his forefinger, and, slowly 
recovering that hand, settled his chin in it again as he looked 
at the fire. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


145 


“ Anyways,” said the damsel, I am glad punishment fol- 
lowed, and I say so.” 

But she was here interrupted by her father’s voice ex- 
claiming angrily, “ Now, Poll Parrot I ” and by her father’s 
hat being heavily flung from his hand and striking her face. 

Blest if I believe such a Poll Parrot as you was ever 
learned to speak!” growled Mr. Biderhood. “Ain’t you 
got nothing to do but fold your arms and stand a Poll-Par- 
roting allnight ? ” 

“ Let her alone,” urged the man. “ She was only speak- 
ing to me.” 

“ And who may you be, and what may you want ? ” 

“ How can I tell you until you are silent? ” returned the 
other, fiercely. 

“ Well,” said Mr. Riderhood, quailing a little, “ I am will- 
ing to be silent for the purpose of hearing. But don’t Poll- 
Parrot me.” 

“ Are you thirsty, you ? ” the man asked, in the same 
fierce short way, after returning his look. 

“ Why nat’rally,” said Mr. Riderhood, “ ain’t I always 
thirsty I ” 

“ What will you drink ? ” demanded the man. 

“Sherry wine,” returned Mr. Riderhood, in the same 
sharp tone, “ if you’re capable of it.” 

The man put his hand in his pocket, took out half a sover- 
eign, and begged of Miss Pleasant that she would fetch a 
bottle. “ With the cork undrawn,” he added, emphatically, 
looking at her father. 

“ I’ll take my Alfred David,” muttered Mr. Riderhood, 
slowly relaxing into a dark smile, “ that you know a move. 
Do I know youf N — n— no, I don’t know you.” 

The man rejDlied, “No, you don’t know me.” And so 
they stood looking at one another surlily enough, until 
Pleasant came back. 

The visitor first held the bottle against the light of the 
candle, and next examined the top of the cork. Satisfied 
that it had not been tampered with, he slowly took from his 
breastpocket a rusty clasp-knife, and, with a corkscrew in 
the handle, opened the wine. That done, he looked at the 
cork, unscrewed it from the corkscrew, laid each separately 
10 


146 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


on the table, and, with the end of the sailor’s knot of his 
neckerchief, dusted the inside of the neck of the bottle. All 
this with great deliberation. 

At first Riderhood had sat with his glass extended at arm’s 
length for filling, but gradually his arm reverted home to 
him, and his glass was lowered and lowered until he rested it 
upon the table. His attention became concentrated on the 
knife. And now, as the man held out the bottle to fill all 
round, Riderhood stood up, leaned over the table to look 
closer at the knife, and stared from it to him. 

‘‘ What’s the matter ? ” asked the man. 

“ Why, I know that knife ! ” said Riderhood. 

“ Yes, I dare say you do.” 

“That there knife was the knife of a seaman named 
George Radfoot.” 

“It was.” 

“ That seaman was well beknown to me.” 

“He was.” 

“ What’s come to him ? ” 

“ Death has come to him. Death came to him in an ugly 
shape. He looked,” said the man, “ very horrible after it.” 

“ Arter what ? ” said Riderhood, with a frowning stare. 

“ After he was killed.” 

“Killed? Who killed him?” 

The man only answered with a shrug. 

“ You don’t mean to tell a honest man — ” Riderhood was 
recommencing with his empty glass in his hand, when his eye 
became fascinated by the stranger’s outer coat. , He leaned 
across the table to see it nearer, touched the sleeve, turned 
the cuff to look at the sleeve-lining (the man, in his perfect 
composure, offering not the least objection), and exclaimed, 
“ It’s my belief as this here coat was George Radfoot’s too ! ” 

“ You are right. He wore it the last time you ever saw 
him, and the last time you ever will see him — in this world.” 

“ It’s my belief you mean to tell me to my face you 
killed him ! ” exclaimed Riderhood : but, nevertheless, allow- 
ing his glass to be filled again. 

The man only answered with another shrug, and showed 
no symptom of confusion. 

“ Wish I may die if I knoAV what to be up to with this 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


147 


chap ! ” said Riderhood, after staring at him, and tossing his 
last glassful down his throat. “Let’s know what to make 
of you. Say something plain.” 

“ I will,” returned the other, leaning forward across the 
table, and speaking in a low impressive voice. “ What a liar 
you are ! When you went to that lawyer yonder in the 
Temple with that invented story, you might have had your 
strong suspicions of a friend of your own, you know. I 
think you had, you know.” 

‘ ‘ Me my suspicions ? Of what friend ? ” 

“ Tell me again whose knife was this ? ” demanded the 
man. 

“ It was possessed by, and was the property of — him as I 
have made mention on,” said Riderhood. 

“ Tell me again whose coat was this ! ” 

“ That there article of clothing likeways belonged to, and 
was wore by — him as I have made mention on.” 

“ I suspect that you gave him the credit of the deed, and of 
keeping cleverly out of the way. But there was small clev- 
erness in his keeping out of the way. The cleverness would 
havobeen, to have got back for one single instant to the light 
of the sun.” 

“ Things is come to a pretty pass,” growled Mr. Rider- 
hood, rising to his feet, goaded to stand at bay, “ when bul- 
lyers as is wearing dead men’s clothes, and bullyers as is 
armed with dead men’s knives, is to came into the houses of 
honest live men, getting their livings by the sweats of their 
brows, and is to make these here sort of charges with no 
rhyme and no reason, neither the one nor yet the other! 
Why should I have had my suspicions of him ? ” 

“ Because you knew him,” replied the man ; “ because you 
had been one with him, and knew his real character under a 
fair outside ; because on the night which you had afterwards 
reason to believe to be the very night of the murder, he 
came in here, within an hour of his having left his ship in the 
docks, and asked you in what lodgings he could find room. 
W as there no stranger with him ? ” 

“ I’ll take my world-without-end everlasting Alfred Da- 
vid that YOU warn’t with him,” answered Riderhood. “You 
talk big, you do, but things look pretty black against your- 


148 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


self, to my thinking. You charge agin me that G-eorge Rad- 
foot got lost sight of, and was no more thought of. What’s 
that for a sailor ? You tell me G-eorge Radf oot got killed. I 
ask you who done it and how you know it. You carry his 
knife and you wear his coat. Now then ! I want to know 
how G-eorge Radfoot come by his death, and how you come 
by his kit ? ” 

If you ever do know, you won’t know now.” 

“And next I want to know,” proceeded Riderhood; 
“ whether you mean to charge that what-you-may-call-it 
murder — ” 

“ Harmon murder, father,” suggested Pleasant. 

“ No Poll-Parroting ! ” he vociferated, in return. “ Keep 
your mouth shut ! — I want to know, you sir, whether you 
charge that there crime on G-eorge Radfoot ? ” 

“ If you ever do know, you won’t know now.” 

“ Perhaps you done it yourseK ? ” said Riderhood, with a 
threatening action. 

“ I alone know,” returned the man, sternly shaking his 
head, “ the mysteries of that crime. I alone know that your 
trumped-up story cannot possibly be true. I alone -know 
that it must be altogether false, and that you must know it to 
be altogether false. I come here to-night to tell you so 
much of what I know, and no more.” 

“ Shut the shop-door! ” said Riderhood to his daughter. 
“ And turn the key and stand b}^ it I If you know all this, 
you sir, why han’t you gone to Lawyer Lightwood ? ” 

“ That, also, is alone known to myself.” 

“ Don’t you know that, if you didn’t do the deed, what 
you say you could tell is worth from five to ten thousand 
pound ? ” asked Riderhood. 

“ I know it very well, and when I claim the money you 
shall share it. I know it as well as I know that you and 
G-eorge Radfoot were one together in more than one dark 
business ; and as well as I know that you, Roger Riderhood, 
conspired against an innocent man for blood-money ; and as 
well as I know that I can — and that I swear I will ! — give 
you up on both scores, and be the proof against you in my 
own person, if you defy me 1 ” 

“ Is it fair,” cried Mr. Riderhood, propitiatingly and ci awl- 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


149 


ingly, to talk of my defying you afore ever you say what 
you want of me ? ” 

“ I don’t want much,” said the man. This accusation of 
yours must not be left half made and half unmade. What 
was done for the blood-money must be thoroughly undone.” 
Well ; but Shipmate — ” 

Don’t call me Shipmate,” said the man. 

“Captain, then,” urged Mr. Riderhood; “there! You 
won’t object to Captain. It’s a honorable title, and you fully 
look it. Captain! Ain’t the man dead? Now I ask you 
fair. Ain’t Graffer dead ? ” 

“ Well,” returned the other, with impatience, “yes, he is 
dead. What then ? ” 

“ Can words hurt a dead man. Captain ? I only ask you 


fair.” 


“ They can hurt the memory of a dead man, and they can 
hurt his living children. It is dreadful that any stigma 
should attach to them,” said the visitor, wdiom the consider- 
ation rendered so uneasy that he rose, and paced to and fro, 
muttering, “Dreadful! Unforeseen! How could it be 
foreseen ! Y ou shall sign a statement that it was all utterly 
false, and the poor girl shall have it. I will bring it with me 
for your signature, when I come again.” 

“ When might you be expected. Captain ? ” inquired Ri- 
derhood, again dubiously getting between him and the door. 

“ Quite soon enough for you. I shall not disappoint you ; 
don’t be afraid.” 

“ Might you be inclined to leave any name. Captain ? ” 

“ No, not at all. I have no such intention,” and he passed 
out of the shop, nodding to Pleasant kindly. 


CHAPTER XXYII. 



HE wind was blowing so hard when the visitor came 


out at the shop-door into the darkness and dirt of 
Limehouse Hole, that it almost blew him in again. Indiffer- 
ent to the weather, and even preferring it to better weather 
for its clearance of the streets, the man looked about him 
with a scrutinizing glance. “ Thus much I know,” he mur- 
mured. “ I have never been here since that night, and never 


150 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


was here before that night, but thus much I recognize. I 
wonder which way did we take when we came out of that 
shop. W e turned to the right as I have turned, but I can re- 
call no more. Did we go by this alley ? Or down that lane ? ” 

He tried both, but both confused him equally, and he 
came straying back to the same spot. “ I remember there 
were poles pushed out of upper windows on which clothes 
were drying, and I remember a low public-house, and the 
sound flowing down a narrow passage belonging to it, of the 
scraping of a fiddle and the shuffling of feet. But here are 
all these things in the lane, and here are all these things in 
the alley. And I have nothing else in my mind but a wall, a 
dark door-way, a flight of stairs, and a room.” 

He tried a new direction, but made nothing of it ; avails, 
dark door-ways, flights of stairs and rooms, were too abun- 
dant. Arid, like most people so puzzled, he again and again 
described a circle, and found himself at the point from which 
he had begun. 

Here he ceased to be the oakum-headed, oakum- whisker- 
ed man on whom Miss Pleasant Riderhood had looked, and, 
allowing for his being still wrapped in a nautical overcoat, 
became as like that same lost wanted Mr. Julius Handford 
as never man was hke another in this world. Yet in that 
same moment he was the Secretary also, Mr. Boffin’s Secre- 
tary. For John Rokesmith, too, was as like that same lost 
wanted Mr. Julius Handford as never man was like another 
in this world. 

have no clue to the scene of my death,” said he. 

When I came back to England, I came back, shrinking 
from my father’s money, shrinking from my father’s memo- 
ry, mistrustful of being forced on a mercenary wife, mis- 
trustful o£ my father’s intention in thrusting that marriage 
on me, mistrustful that I was already growing avaricious, 
mistrustful that I was slackening in gratitude to the two 
dear noble honest friends who had made the only sunlight in 
my childish life or that of my heart-broken sister. Now, 
stop, and so far think it out, John Harmon. Is that so ? 
That is exactly so. 

‘‘ On board serving as third mate was George Radfoot. I 
knew nothing of him. His name first became known to me 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


151 


about a week before we sailed, through my being accosted 
by one of the ship-agent’s clerks as ^ Mr. Radfoot.’ It was 
one day when I had gone aboard to look to my preparations, 
and the clerk, coming behind me as I stood on deck, tapped 
me on the shoulder, and said, ‘ Mr. Radfoot, look here,’ re- 
ferring to some papers that he had in his hand. And my 
name first became known to Radfoot through another clerk 
within a day or two, and while the ship was yet in port, 
coming up behind him, tapping him on the shoulder and be- 
ginning, ^ I beg your pardon, Mr. Harmon — .’ 

A sociable word or two on these mistakes became an 
easy introduction between us, and the weather was hot, and 
he helped me to a cool cabin on deck alongside his own, and 
his first school had been at Brussels as mine had been, and 
he had learned French as I had learned it, and he had a little 
history of himself to relate — Grod only knows how much of 
it true, and how much of it false — that had its likeness to 
mine. I had been a seaman too. So we got to be confi- 
dential together, and the more easily yet, because he and 
every one on board had known by general rumor what I 
was making the voyage to England for. By such degrees 
and means, he came to the knowledge of my uneasiness of 
mind, and of its setting at that time in the direction of 
desiring to see and form some judgment of my allotted 
wife, before she could possibly know me for myself ; also 
to try Mrs. Boffin and give her a glad surprise. So the plot 
was made out of our getting common sailors’ dresses (as 
he was able to guide me about London), and throwing 
ourselves in Bella Wilfer’s neighborhood, and trying to put 
ourselves in her way, and doing whatever chance might fa- 
vor on the spot, and seeing what came of it. If nothing 
came of it, I should be no worse off, and there would 
merely be a short delay in my presenting myself to Light- 
wood. I have all these facts right? Yes. They are all 
accurately right. 

“ His advantage in all this was, that for a time I was to be 
lost. It might be for a day or for two days, but I must be 
lost sight of on landing, or there would be recognition, antic- 
ipation, and failure. Therefore, I disembarked with my 
valise in my hand — as Potterson the steward and Mr. Jacob 


152 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Kibble my fellow-passenger afterwards remembered — and 
waited for him in the dark by that very Limehouse Church 
which is now behind me. 

“ As I had always shunned the port of London, I only 
knew the church through his pointing out its spire from on 
board. Perhaps I might recall, if it were any good to try, 
the way by which I went to it alone from the river ; but how 
we two went from it to Riderhood’s shop, I don’t know — 
any more than I know what turns we took and doubles we 
made, after we left it. 

“ When we stopped at Riderhood’s, and he asked that 
scoundrel a question or two, purporting to refer only to the 
lodging-houses in which there was accommodation for us, 
had I the least suspicion of him ? None. Certainly none 
until afterwards when I held the clue. I think he must 
have got from Riderhood in a paper, the drug, or whatever 
it was, that afterwards stupefied me, but I am far from sure. 
All I felt safe in charging on him to-night, was old compan- 
ionship in villainy between them. But I am not clear about 
the drug. I remember his changing a small folded paper 
from one pocket to another, after we came out, which he had 
not touched before. I now know Riderhood to have been 
previously taken up for being concerned in the robbery of 
an unlucky seaman, to whom some such poison had been 
given. 

“It is my conviction that we cannot have gone a mile 
from that shop, before we came to the wall, the dark door- 
way, the flight of stairs, and the room. The night was par- 
ticularly dark, and it rained hard. As I think the circum- 
stances back, I hear the rain splashing on the stone pave- 
ment of the passage, which was not under cover. The room 
overlooked the river, or a dock, or a creek, and the tide was 
out. Being possessed of the time down to that point, I 
know by the hour that it must have been about low water ; 
but while the coffee was getting ready, I drew back the cur- 
tain (a dark-brown curtain), and, looking out, knew by the 
kind of reflection below, of the few neighboring lights, that 
they were reflected in tidal mud. 

“ He had carried under his arm a canvas bag, containing a 
suit of his clothes. I had no change of outer clothes with 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


153 


me, as I was to buy slops. ‘ You are very wet, Mr. Harmon,’ 
— I can hear him saying — ‘ and I am quite dry under this 
good waterproof coat. Put on these clothes of mine. Y ou 
may find on trying them that they will answer your purpose 
to-morrow, as well as the slops you mean to buy, or better. 
While you change, I’ll hurry the hot coffee.’ When he 
came back, I had his clothes on, and there was a black man 
with him, wearing a linen jacket, like a steward, who put 
the smoking coffee on the table in a tray and never looked at 
me. I am so far literal and exact ? Literal and exact, I am 
certain. 

How, I pass to sick and deranged impressions ; they are 
so strong, that I rely upon them ; but there are spaces be- 
tween them that I know nothing about, and they are not 
pervaded by any idea of time. 

“ I had drunk some coffee, when to my sense of sight he 
began to swell immensely, and something urged me to rush 
at him. W e had a struggle near the door. He got from me, 
through my not knowing where to strike, in the whirling 
round of the room, and the flashing of flames of fire be- 
tween us. I dropped down. Lying helpless on the ground, 
I was turned over by a foot. I was dragged by the neck into 
a corner. I heard men speak together. I was turned over 
by other feet. I saw a figure like myself lying dressed in 
my clothes on a bed. What might have been, for anything 
I knew, a silence of days, weeks, months, years, was broken 
by a violent wrestling of men all over the room. The figure 
like myself was assailed, and my valise was in its hand. I 
was trodden upon and fallen over. I heard a noise of blows, 
and thought it was a wood-cutter cutting down a tree. I 
could not have said that my name was John Harmon — I 
could not have thought it — I didn’t know it — but when I 
heard the blows, I thought of the wood-cutter and his axe, 
and had some dead idea that I was lying in a forest. 

“ This is still correct ? Still correct, with the exception 
that I cannot possibly express it to myself without using the 
word I. But it was not I. There was no such thing as I, 
within my knowledge. 

It was only after a downward slide through something 
like a tube, and then a great noise and a sparkling and 


154 


COJSDEJSSED CLASSICS. 


crackling as of fires, that the consciousness came upon me, 
‘ This is John Harmon drowning I John Harmon, struggle 
for your life. John Harmon, call on Heaven and save 
yourself ! ’ I think I cried it out aloud in a great agony, 
and then a heavy horrid unintelligible something vanished, 
and it was I who was struggling there alone in the water. 

“ I was very weak and faint, frightfully oppressed with 
drowsiness, and driving fast with the tide. Looking over 
the black water, I saw the lights racing past me on the two 
banks of the river, as if they were eager to be gone and 
leave me dying in the dark. Gruiding myself safely with 
Heaven’s assistance before the fierce set of the water, I at 
last caught at a boat moored, one of a tier of boats at a cause- 
way, I was sucked under her, and came up, only just alive, 
on the other side. 

“ W as I long in the water ? Long enough to be chilled to 
the heart, but I don’t know how long. Yet the cold was 
merciful, for it was the cold night air and the rain that re- 
stored me from a swoon on the stones of the causeway. 
They naturally supposed me to have toppled in, drunk, 
when I crept to the public-house it belonged to ; for I had 
no notion where I was, and could not articulate — through 
the poison having affected my speech — and I supposed the 
night to be the previous night, as it was still dark and rain- 
ing. But I had lost twenty -four hours. 

“ I have checked the calculation often, and it must have 
been two nights that I lay recovering in that public-house. 
Let me see. Yes. I am sure it was while I lay in that bed 
there, that the thought entered my head of turning the dan- 
ger I had passed through, to the account of being for some 
time supposed to have disappeared mysteriously, and of 
proving Bella. 

I could not have done it, but for the fortune in the wa- 
ter-proof belt round my body. Not a great fortune, forty 
and odd pounds for the inheritor of a hundred and odd thou- 
sand! But it was enough. Without it I must have dis- 
closed myself. 

‘‘ Some twelve days I lived at that hotel. Gfoing out that 
night to walk, I found a crowd assembled round a placard. 
It described myself, John Harmon, as found dead and muti- 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


155 


lated in the river, under circumstances of strong suspicion, 
described my dress, described the papers in my pockets, and 
stated Avhere I was lying for recognition. In a wild incau- 
tious way I hurried there, and there — with the horror of the 
death I had escaped before my eyes in its most appalling 
shape, added to the inconceivable horror tormenting me at 
that time when the poisonous stuff was strongest on me — I 
perceived that Eadfoot had been murdered by some un- 
known hands for the money for which he would have mur- 
dered me, and that probably we had both been shot into the 
river from the same dark place into the same dark tide, 
when the stream ran deep and strong. 

“The Inquest declared me dead; the Government pro- 
claimed me dead ; I could not listen at my fireside for five 
minutes to the outer noises, but it was borne into my ears 
that I was dead. 

“So John Harmon' died, and Julius Handford disap- 
peared, and John Rokesmith was born. J ohn Rokesmith’s 
intent to-night has been to repair a wrong that he could nev- 
er have imagined possible, coming to his ears through the 
Lightwood talk related to him, and which he is bound by 
every consideration to remedy. In that intent John Roke- 
smith will persevere, as his duty is. 

‘ ‘ N o w, is it all thought out ? JST othing omitted ? Should 
John Harmon come to life ? 

“If yes, why? If no, why? 

“ Take yes, first. To enlighten human Justice concern- 
ing the ofense of one far beyond it who may have a living 
mother. To enlighten it with the lights of a stone passage, 
a. flight of stairs, a brown window-curtain, and a black man. 
To come into possession of my father’s money, and with it 
sordidly to buy a beautiful creature whom I love — I cannot 
help it ; reason has nothing to do with it ; but who would as 
soon love me for my own sake, as she would love the beggar 
at the corner. 

“ Now, take no. Because he has passively allowed dear 
old faithful friends to pass into possession of the property. 
Because he sees them happy with it, making a good use of it, 
effacing the old rust and tarnish on the money. Because 
they have virtually adopted Bella, and will provide for her. 


156 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Because there is affection enough in her nature, and warmth 
enough in her heart, to develop into something enduringly 
good, under favorable conditions. Because her faults have 
been intensified by her place in my father’s will, and she is 
already growing better. Because her marriage with John 
Harmon, after what I have heard from her own lips, would 
be a shocking mockery, of which both she and I must al- 
ways be conscious, and which would degrade her in her 
mind, and me in mine, and each of us in the other’s. Be- 
cause if John Harmon comes to life and does not marry her, 
the property falls into the very hands that hold it now. 

What course for me then? This. To live the same 
quiet Secretary life, until they shall have become more ac- 
customed to their altered state, and until the great swarm of 
swindlers shall have found newer prey. 

That I may never, in the days to come afar off, have any 
weak misgiving that Bella might, in any contingency, have 
taken me for my own sake if I had plainly asked her, I loill 
plainly ask her : proving beyond all question what I already 
know too well. And now it is all thought out, from the be- 
ginning to the end, and my mind is easier.” 

The living-dead man, in thus communing with himself, 
had regarded neither the wind nor the way, and had resisted 
the former as instinctively as he had pursued the latter. But 
being now come into the City, where there was a coach- 
stand, he decided to go first to Mr. Boffin’s house. 

He found that Mr. and Mrs. Boffin were out, but that Miss 
Wilfer was in the drawing-room. Miss Wilfer had remain- 
ed at home, in consequence of not feeling very well, and had 
inquired in the evening if Mr. Rokesmith were in his room. 

Make my compliments to Miss Wilfer, and say I am here 
now.” 

Miss Wilfer’s compliments came down in return, and if it 
were not too much trouble, would Air. Rokesmith be so kind 
as to come up before he went ? 

Hear me ! Are you not well, Mr. Rokesmith ? ” 

“ Yes, quite well. I was sorry to hear, when I came in, 
that you were not.” 

“A mere nothing. I had a headache — gone now — and 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


157 


was not quite fit for a hot theatre, so I stayed at home. I 
asked you if you were not well, because you look so white.” 

Do I ? I have had a busy evening.” 

“ Mr. Rokesmith,” said Bella, taking up her work, and in- 
specting it all round the corners, “ I wanted to say some- 
thing to you when I could have the opportunity, as an ex- 
planation why I was rude to you the other day. You have 
no right to think ill of me, sir.” 

You don’t know how well I think of you. Miss Wilfer.” 

“ Truly you must have a very high opinion of me, Mr. 
Rokesmitli, when you believe that in prosperity I neglect 
and forget my old home.” 

“ Do I believe so? ” 

You did^ sir, at any rate,” returned Bella. 

“ I took the liberty of reminding you of a little omission 
into which you had fallen — insensibly and naturally fallen. 
It was no more than that.” 

‘‘ And I beg leave to ask you, Mr. Rokesmith,” said Bella, 
why you took that liberty ? — I hope there is no offense in 
the phrase ; it is your own, remember.” 

“Because I am truly, deeply, profoundly interested in 
you. Miss Wilfer. Because I wish to see you always at your 
best. Because I — shall I go on ? ” 

“ No, sir,” returned Bella, with a burning face, “ you have 
said more than enough. I beg that you will not go on. If 
you have any generosity, any honor, you will say no more. 
I wish to speak to you, sir, once for all, and I don’t know 
how to do it. I have sat here all this evening, wishing to 
speak to you, and determined to speak to you, and feeling 
that I must. I beg for a moment’s time.” 

He remained silent, and she remained with her face 
averted, sometimes making a slight movement as if she 
would turn and speak. At length she did so. 

“ You know how I am situated here, sir, and you know 
how I am situated at home. I must speak to you for myself, 
since there is no one about me whom I could ask to do so. It 
is not generous in you, it is not honorable in you, to conduct 
yourself towards me as you do.” 

“ Is it ungenerous or dishonorable to be devoted to you; 
fascinated by you ? ” 


158 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Preposterous ! ” said Bella. 

The late John Harmon might have thought it rather a 
contemptuous and lofty word of repudiation. 

“I now feel obliged to go on/’ pursued the Secretary^ 
“ though it were only in self-explanation and self-defense. 
I hope, Miss WiKer, that it is not unpardonable — even in me 
— to make an honest declaration of an honest devotion to 
you.” 

“ An honest declaration ! ” repeated Bella, with emphasis. 

“ Is it otherwise ? ” 

“ I must request, sir,” said Bella, taking refuge in a touch 
of timely resentment, that I may not be questioned. You 
must excuse me if I decline to be cross-examined.” 

“ Oh, Miss Wilfer, this is hardly charitable. I ask you 
nothing but what your own emphasis suggests. However, 
I waive even that question. But what I have declared, I 
take my stand by. I cannot recall the avowal of my earnest 
and deep attachment to you, and I do not recall it.” 

I reject it, sir,” said Bella. 

“ I should be blind and deaf if I were not prepared for the 
reply. Forgive my offense, for it carries its punishment 
with it.” 

What punishment ? ” asked Bella. 

“ Is my present endurance none ? But excuse me ; I did 
not mean to cross-examine you again.” 

“You take advantage of a hasty word of mine,” said 
Bella, with a little sting of self-reproach, “ to make me seem 
— I don’t know what. I spoke without consideration when 
I'Used it. If that was bad, I am sorry ; but you repeat it after 
consideration, and that seems to me to be at least no better. 
For the rest, I beg it may be understood, Mr. Bokesmith, 
that there is an end of this between us, now and for ever.” 

“ Now and for ever,” he repeated. 

“Yes. I appeal to you, sir,” proceeded Bella, with in- 
creasing spirit, “ not to pursue me. I appeal to you not to 
take advantage of your position in this house to make my 
position in it distressing and disagreeable. I appeal to you 
to discontinue your habit of making your misplaced atten- 
tions as plain to Mrs. Boffin as to me.” 

“ Have I done so ? ” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


159 


“ I should think you have,” replied Bella. In any case it 

is not your fault if you have not, Mr. Rokesmith.” 

“ I hope you are wrong in that impression. I should be 
very sorry to have justified it, I think I have not. For the 
future there is no apprehension. It is all over.” 

“ I am much relieved to hear it,” said Bella. I have far 
other views in life, and why should you waste your own ? ” 
Mine ! ” said the Secretary. My life ! Pardon me. 
Miss Wilfer,” he proceeded, when their eyes met ; “ you 
have used some hard words, for which I do not doubt you 
have a justification in your mind, that I do not understand. 
U ngenerous and dishonorable. In what ? ” 

“ You know,” retorted Bella, with her old indignation ris- 
ing, “ the history of my being here at all. I have heard Mr. 
Boffin say that you are master of every line and word of that 
will, as you are master of all his affairs. And was it not 
enough that I should have been willed away like a horse, or 
a dog, or a bird ; but must you too begin to dispose of me in 
your mind, and speculate in me, as soon as I had ceased to be 
the talk and the laugh of the town ? Am I for ever to be 
made the property of strangers ? ” 

“ Believe me, you are wonderfully mistaken.” 

“ I should be glad to know it,” answered Bella. 

“ I doubt if you ever will. Good-night. Of course I shall 
be careful to conceal any traces of this interview from Mr. 
and Mrs. Boffin, as long as I remain here. Trust me, what 
you have complained of is at an end for ever.” 

“ I am glad I have spoken, then, Mr. Rokesmith. It has 
been painful and difficult, but it is done. If I have hurt you, 
I hope you will forgive me. I am inexperienced and impet- 
uous, and I have been a little spoiled ; but I really am not so 
bad as I dare say I appear, or as you think me.” 

CHAPTER XXYIII. 

A RRIYIXG at the Boffin mansion the next morning, the 
Secretary found Betty Higden waiting for him. 

“ I should thank you kindly, sir,” said Betty, “ if I might 
make so bold as to have a word or two wi’ you.” 

She should have as many words as she liked, he told her ; 
and took her into his room, and made her sit down. 


160 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ ’Tis concerning Sloppy, sir. And that’s how I come 
here by myself. Not wishing him to know what I’m a- 
going to say to you, I got the start of him early and walked 
up. ’Tis just this, sir. It can’t be reasoned out of his head 
by any powers of mine but what that he can do right by 
your kind lady and gentleman and do his work for me, both 
together. Now, he can’t. To give himself up to being put 
in the way of arning a good living and getting on, he must 
give me up. Well, he won’t.” 

“ I respect him for it,” said Rokesmith. 

“ Do ye, sir ? I don’t know but what I do myself. Still 
that don’t make it right to let him have his way. So as he 
won’t give me up, I’m a-going to give him up.” 

“How, Betty?” 

“ I’m a-going to run away from him. ’Tis a poor living 
and a hard as is to be got out of this work that I’m a 
doing now, -and but for Sloppy I don’t know as I should 
have held to it this long. But it did just keep us on, the two 
together. Now that I’m alone — with even Johnny gone — 
I’d far sooner be upon my feet and tiring of myself out, than 
a sitting folding and folding by the fire. And I’ll tell you 
why. There’s a deadness steals over me at times, that the 
kind of life favors and I don’t like. I’d far better be a-walk- 
ing than a-getting numbed and dreary. I’m a good fair 
knitter, and can make many little things to sell. The loan 
from your lady and gentleman of twenty shillings to fit out a 
basket with, would be a fortune for me. Trudging round 
the country and tiring of myself out, I shall keep the dead- 
iness ofi‘, and get my own bread by my own labor.” 

“ And this is your plan for running away ? ” 

“ Show me a better ! My deary, show me a better ! 
Why, I know very well,” said old Betty Higden, “ and you 
know very well, that your lady and gentleman would set me 
up like a queen for the rest of my life, if so be that we could 
make it right among us to have it so. But we can’t make it 
right among us to have it so. I’ve never took charity yet, 
nor yet has any one belonging to me.” 

“And to be sure,” added the Secretary, as a comfort for 
her, “ Sloppy will be eagerly looking forward to his oppor- 
tunity of being to you what you have been to him.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


161 


“ Trust him for that, sir ! ” said Betty, cheerfully. 

The Secretary felt that there was no gainsaying what was 
urged by this brave old heroine, and he presently repaired to 
Mrs. Boffin and recommended her to let Betty Higden have 
her way, at all events for the time. “ It would be far more 
satisfactory to your kind heart, I know, to provide for her, 
but it may be a duty to respect this independent spirit.” 

Must it be done ? ” asked Mrs. Boffin. 

“ I think it must.” 

After discussion it was agreed that it should be donCj and 
Mrs. Boffin summoned Bella to note down the little pur- 
chases that were necessary to set Betty up in trade. 

CHAPTER XXIX. 

schoolmaster and the pupil emerged upon the Lead- 
JL enhall Street region, spying eastward for Lizzie. Be- 
ing something too soon in their arrival, they lurked at a cor- 
ner, waiting for her to appear. 

“ Here she comes, Mr. Headstone ! Let us go forward 
and meet her.” 

She greeted her brother with the usual warmth, and 
touched the extended hand of Bradley. 

“ Why, where are you going, Charley, dear ? ” 

“Nowhere. We came on purpose to meet you.” 

“ To meet me, Charley ? ” 

“Yes. We are going to walk with you. But don’tlet us 
take the great leading streets where every one walks, and 
we can’t hear ourselves speak. Let us go by the quiet back- 
ways. Here’s a large paved court by this church, and quiet, 
too. Let us go up here. ’ ’ 

“ But it’s not in the way, Charley.” 

“Yes it is,” said the boy, petulantly. “It’s in my way, 
and my way is yours.” 

She had not released his hand, and still holding it, looked 
at him with a kind of appeal. He avoided her eyes, under 
pretense of saying, “ Come along, Mr. Headstone.” Brad- 
ley walked at his side — not at hers — and the brother and 
sister walked hand in hand. The court brought them to a 
church-yard a paved square court, with a raised bank of 
earth about it. 


162 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


They paced the whole of this place once, in a constrained 
and uncomfortable manner, when the boy stopped and said : 

“ Lizzie, Mr. Headstone has something to say to you. I 
don’t wish to be an interruption either to him or to you, and 
so I’ll go and take a little stroll and come back. I know in a 
general way what Mr. Headstone intends to say, and I very 
highly approve of it, as I hope — and indeed I do not doubt — 
you will. I need not tell you, Lizzie, that I am under great 
obligations to Mr. Headstone, and that I am very anxious 
for Mr. Headstone to succeed in all he undertakes. As I 
hope — and as, indeed, I don’t doubt — you must be.” 

Charley,” returned his sister, detaining his hand as he 
withdrew it, “I think you had better stay. I think Mr. 
Headstone had better not say what he thinks of saying.” 

“ Why, how do you know what it is ? ” returned the boy. 

“ Perhaps I don’t, but — ” 

“ Perhaps you don’t ? No, Liz, I should think not. If 
you knew what it was, you would give me a very different 
answer. There ; let go ; be sensible. I wonder you don’t 
remember that Mr. Headstone is looking on.” 

She allowed him to separate himself from her, and he, aft- 
er saying, “Now, Liz, be a rational girl and a good sister,” 
walked away. She remained standing alone with Bradley 
Headstone, and it was not until she raised her eyes, that he 
spoke. 

“ I said,” he began, “ when I saw you last, that there was 
something unexplained, which might perhaps influence you. 
I have come this evening to explain it. I hope you will not 
judge of me by my hesitating manner when I speak to 3mu. 
You see me at my greatest disadvantage. It is most unfor- 
tunate for me that I wish you to see me at my best, and that 
I know you see me at my worst.” 

She moved slowly on when he paused, and he moved 
slowly on beside her. 

“ It seems egotistical to begin by saying so much about 
myself,” he resumed, “ but whatever I say to you seems, 
even in my own ears, below what I want to say, and differ- 
ent from what I want to say. I can’t help it. So it is. You 
are the ruin of me.” 

She started at the passionate sound of the last words, and 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


163 


at the passionate action of his hands, with which they were 
accompanied. 

“Yes! you are the ruin — the ruin — the ruin — of me. I 
have no resource in myself, I have no confidence in myself, I 
have no government of myself when you are near me or in 
my thoughts. And you are always in my thoughts now. I 
have never been quit of you since I first saw you. Oh, that 
was a wretched day for me 1 That was a wretched, misera- 
ble day ! ” 

A touch of pity for him mingled with her dislike of him, 
and she said : “ Mr. Headstone, I am grieved to have done 
you any harm, but I have never meant it.” 

“ There I ” he cried, despairingly. “ Now, I seem to have 
reproached you, instead of revealing to you the state of my 
own mind ! Bear with me. I am always wrong when you 
are in question. It is my doom.” 

Struggling with himself, and by times looking up at the 
deserted windows of the houses as if there could be anything 
written in their grimy panes that would help him, he paced 
the whole pavement at her side, before he spoke again. 

“ I must try to give expression to what is in my mind ; it 
shall and must be spoken. Though you see me so confound- 
ed — though you strike me so helpless — I ask you to believe 
that there are many people who think well of me ; that there 
are some people who highly esteem me ; that I have in my 
way won a station which is considered worth winning.” 

“ Surely, Mr. Headstone, I do believe it. Surely I have 
always known it from Charley.” 

“ I ask you to believe that if I were to offer my home such 
as it is, my station such as it is, my affections such as they 
are, to any one of the best considered, and best qualified, and 
most distinguished, among the young women engaged in 
my calling, they would probably be accepted. Even readily 
accepted.” 

‘ I do not doubt it,” said Lizzie, with her e 3 ms upon the 
ground. 

“ I have sometimes had it in my thoughts to make that of- 
fer and to settle down as many men of my class do : I on the 
one side of a school, my wife on the other, both of us inter- 
ested in the same work.” 


164 


CONDEJSSED CLASSICS. 


‘‘Why have you not done so?” asked Lizzie Hexam. 
“ Why do you not do so ? ” 

“ Far better that I never did ! The only one grain of 
comfort I have had these many v^eeks,” he said, always 
speaking passionately, and, when most emphatic, repeating 
that former action of his hands, which was like flinging his 
heart’s blood down before her in drops upon the pavement- 
stones, “ the only one grain of comfort I have had these 
many weeks is, that I never did. For if I had, and if the 
same spell had come upon me for my ruin, I know I should 
have broken that tie asunder as if it had been thread.” 

She glanced at him with a glance of fear, and a shrinking 
gesture. He answered, as if she had spoken. 

“ Ho ! It would not have been voluntary on my part, 
any more than it is voluntary in me to be here now. You 
draw me to you. If I were shut up in a strong prison, you 
would draw me out. I should break through the wall to 
come to you. If I were lying on a sick bed, you would draw 
me up — to stagger to your feet and fall there.” 

The wild energy of the man, now quite let loose, was ab- 
solutely terrible. He stopped and laid his hand upon a 
piece of the coping of the burial-ground enclosure, as if he 
would have dislodged the stone. 

“Ho man know's till the time comes, what depths are 
within him. To some men it never comes ; let them rest 
and be thankful ! To me, you brought it ; on me, you forced 
it ; and the bottom of this raging sea,” striking himself upon 
the breast, “ has been heaved up ever since.” 

“ Mr. Headstone, I have heard enough. Let me stop you 
here. It will be better for you and better for me. Let us 
find my brother.’' 

“Hot yet. It shall and must be spoken. I have been in 
torments ever since I stopped short of it before. You are 
alarmed. It is another of my miseries that I cannot speak 
to you or speak of you without stumbling at every syllable, 
unless I let the check go altogether and run mad. Here is a 
man lighting the lamps. He will be gone directly. I en- 
treat of you let us walk round this place again. You have 
no reason to look alarmed ; I can restrain myself, and I wiU.” 

She yielded to the entreaty — how could she do other- 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


165 


wise ? — and they paced the stones in silence. One by one 
the lights leaped up, making the cold gray church tower 
more remote, and they were alone again. He said no more 
until they had regained the spot where he had broken off; 
there, he again stood still, and again grasped the stone. In 
saying what he said then, he never looked at her ; but looked 
at it and wrenched at it. 

‘‘You know what I am going to say. I love you. What 
other men may mean when they use that expression, I can- 
not tell ; what I mean is, that I am under the influence of 
some tremendous attraction which I have resisted in vain, 
and which overmasters me. You could draw me to fire, you 
could draw me to water, you could draw me to the gallows, 
you could draw me to any death, you could draw me to any- 
thing I have most avoided, you could draw me to any ex- 
posure and disgrace. This and the confusion of my thoughts, 
so that I am fit for nothing, is what I mean by your being the 
ruin of me. But if you would return a favorable answer to 
my offer of myself in marriage, you could draw me to any 
good — every good — with equal force. My circumstances 
are quite easy, and you would want for nothing. My repu- 
tation stands quite high, and would be a shield for yours. If 
you saw me at my work, able to do it well and respected in 
it, you might even come to take a sort of pride in me ; — I 
would try hard that you should. Whatever considerations 
I may have thought of against this offer, I have conquered, 
and I make it with all my heart. Your brother favors me 
to the utmost, and it is likely that we might live and work 
together ; anyhow, it is certain that he would have my best 
influence and support. I don’t know that I could say more 
if I tried. I might only weaken what is ill enough said as it 
is. I only add that if it is any claim on you to be in earnest, 
I am in thorough earnest, dreadful earnest.” 

The powdered mortar from under the stone at which he 
wrenched, rattled on the pavement to confirm his words. 

“ Mr. Headstone — ” 

“ Stop ! I implore you, before you answer me, to walk 
round this place once more. It will give you a minute’s time 
to think, and me a minute’s time to get some fortitude to- 
gether.” 


166 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Again she yielded to the entreaty, and again they came 
back to the same place, and again he worked at the stone. 

“ Is it,” he said, with his attention apparently engrossed 
by it, “ yes, or no ? ” 

“Mr. Headstone, I thank you sincerely, I thank you 
gratefully, and hope you may find a worthy wife before long 
and be very happy. But it is no.” 

“ Is no short time necessary for reflection ; no weeks or 
days ? ” he asked, in the same half-suffocated way. 

“ Hone whatever.” 

“ Are you quite decided, and is there no chance of any 
change in my favor ? ” 

“ I am quite decided, Mr. Headstone, and I am bound to 
answer I am certain there is none.” 

“ Then,” said he, suddenly changing his tone and turning 
to her, and bringing his clenched hand down upon the stone 
with a force that laid the knuckles raw and bleeding ; “ then 
I hope that I may never kill him ! ” 

The dark look of hatred and revenge with which the 
words broke from his livid lips, and with which he stood 
holding out his smeared hand as if it held some w'eapon and 
had just struck a mortal blow, made her so afraid of him that 
she turned to run away. But he caught her by the arm. 

“ Mr. Headstone, let me go. Mr. Headstone, I must call 
for help ! ” 

“It is I who should call for help,” he said; “you don’t 
know yet how much I need it.” 

The working of his face as she shrank from it, glancing 
round for her brother and uncertain what to do, might have 
extorted a cry from her in another instant ; but all at once he 
sternly stopped it, and fixed it, as if Death itself had done so. 

“ There! You see I have recovered myself. Hear me 
out.” 

With much of the dignity of courage, as she recalled her 
self-reliant life and her right to be free from accountability 
to this man, she released her arm from his grasp and stood 
looking full at him. She had never been so handsome in his 
eyes. A shade came over them while he looked back at 
her, as if she drew the very light out of them to herself. 

“ This time, at least, I willle^'e nothing unsaid,” he went 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


167 


on, folding his hands before him, clearly to prevent his being 
betrayed into any impetuous gesture; “this last time at 
least, I will not be tortured with after-thoughts of a lost op- 
portunity. Mr. Eugene Wrayburn.” 

“ Was it of him you spoke in your ungovernable rage and 
violence ? ” Lizzie Hexam demanded with spirit. 

He bit his lip, and looked at her, and said never a word. 

“ Was it Mr. Wrayburn that you threatened ? ” 

He bit his lip again, and looked at her, and said never a 
word. 

“You asked me to hear you out, and you will not speak. 
Let me find my brother.” 

“ Stay ! I threatened no one.” 

Her look dropped for an instant to his bleeding hand. He 
lifted it to his mouth, wiped it on his sleeve, and again folded 
it over the other. “ Mr. Eugene Wrayburn,” he repeated. 

“Why do you mention that name again and .again, Mr.' 
Headstone ? ” 

“ Because it is the text of the little I have left to say. Ob- 
serve ! There are no threats in it. If I utter a threat, stop 
me, and fasten it upon me. Mr. Eugene Wrayburn.” 

A worse threat than was conveyed in his manner of utter- 
ing the name, could hardly have escaped him. 

“He haunts you. You accept favors from him. You 
are willing enough to listen to him. I know it, as well as he 
does.” 

“ Mr. Wrayburn has been considerate and good to me sir,” 
said Lizzie, proudly, “in connection with the death and 
with the memory of my poor father.” 

“No doubt. He is of course a very considerate and a 
very good man, Mr. Eugene Wrayburn.” 

“ He is nothing to you, I think,” said Lizzie, with an in- 
dignation she could not repress. 

“ Oh yes, he is. There you mistake. He is much to me.” 

“ What can he be to you ? ” 

“ He can be a rival to me, among other things.” 

“ Mr. Headstone, it is cowardly in you to speak to me in 
this way. But it makes me able to tell you that I do not like 
you, and that I never have liked you from the first, and that 
no other living creature has anything to do with the effect 
you have produced upon me for yourself.” 


168 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


His head bent for a moment, as if under a weight, and he 
then looked up again, moistening his lips, “ I was going on 
with the little I had left to say. I knew all this about Mr. 
Eugene Wrayburn, all the while you were drawing me to 
you. I strove against the knowledge, but quite in vain. It 
made no difference in me. With Mr. Eugene Wrayburn in 
my mind, I went on. With Mr. Eugene Wrayburn in my 
mind, I spoke to you just now. With Mr. Eugene Wray- 
burn in my mind, I have been set aside and cast out.” 

“ If you give those names to my thanking you for your 
proposal and declining it, is it my fault, Mr. Headstone ? ” 
said Lizzie, compassionating the struggle he could not con- 
ceal, almost as much as she was repelled and alarmed by it. 

“ I am not complaining,” he returned, “ I am only stating 
the case. I had to wrestle with my self-respect when I sub- 
mitted to be drawn to you in spite of Mr. Wrayburn. You 
may imagine how low my self-respect hes now.” 

^She was hurt and angry ; but repressed herself in consid- 
eration of his suffering, and of his being her brother’s friend. 

“And it lies under his feet,” said Bradley, unfolding his 
hands in spite of himself, and fiercely motioning with them 
both towards the stones of the pavement. “ Eemember 
that ! It lies under that fellow’s feet, and he treads upon it 
and exults above it.” 

“ He does not ! ” said Lizzie. 

“He does ! ” said Bradley. “I have stood before him 
face to face, and he crushed me down in the dirt of his con- 
tempt, and walked over me. Why ? Because he knew 
with triumph what was in store for me to-night.” 

“ 0, Mr. Headstone, you talk quite wildly.” 

“ Quite collectedly. I know what I say too well. How 
I have said all. I have used no threat, remember ; I have 
done no more than show you how the case stands ; — how 
the case stands, so far.” 

At this moment her brother sauntered into view close by. 
She darted to him, and caught him by the hand. Bradley 
followed, and laid his heavy hand on the boy’s opposite 
shoulder. 

“ Charley Hexam, I am going home. I must walk home 
by myself to-night, and get shut up in my room without be 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


169 


ing spoken to. Give me half an hour’s start, and let me be 
till you find me at my work in the morning. I shall be at my 
work in the morning just as usual.” 

Clasping his hands, he uttered a short unearthly broken 
cry, and went his way. The brother and sister were left 
looking at one another near a lamp in the solitary church- 
yard, and the boy’s face clouded and darkened, as he said in 
a rough tone : “ What is the meaning of this ? What have 
you done to my best friend ? Out with the truth ! ” 

“ Charley ! Speak a little more considerately ! ” 

I am not in the humor for consideration, or for nonsense 
of any sort,” replied the boy. What have you been do- 
ing ? Why has Mr. Headstone gone from us in that way ? ” 
He asked me — you know he asked me — to be his wife, 
Charley.” 

“ Well ? ” said the boy, impatiently. 

And I was obliged to tell him that I could not.” 

“ You were obliged to tell him,” repeated the boy, angrily, 
between his teeth, and rudely pushing her away. ^‘You 
were obliged to tell him ? Do you know that he is worth 
fifty of you ? ” 

“ It may easily be so, Charley, but I cannot marry him.” 

“ You mean that you are conscious that you can’t appre- 
ciate him, and don’t deserve him, I suppose ? ” 

“ I mean that I do not like him, Charley, and that I will 
never marry him.” 

“ Upon my soul ! ” exclaimed the boy, “ you are a nice 
picture of a sister ! Upon my soul, you are a pretty piece of 
disinterestedness ! And so all my endeavors to cancel the 
past and to raise myself in the world, and to raise you with 
me, are to be beaten down by your low whims ; are they ? ” 

“ I will not reproach you, Charley.” 

‘^Hear her!” exclaimed the boy, looking round at the 
darkness. “ She won’t reproach me I She does her best to 
destroy my fortunes and her own, and she won’t reproach 
me! Why, you’ll tell me, next, that you won’t reproach 
Mr. Headstone for coming out of the sphere to which he is 
an ornament, and putting himself at your feet, to be rejected 
hyyou!''' 

No, Charley ; I will only tell you, as I told himself, that I 


170 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


thank him for doing so, that I am sorfy he did so, and 
that I hope he will do much better, and be happy.” 

Some touch of compunction smote the boy’s hardening 
heart as he looked upon her, his patient little nurse in in- 
fancy, his patient friend, adviser, and reclaimer in boyhood, 
the self-forgetting sister who had done everything for him. 
His tone relented, and he drew her arm through his. 

“ Now, come, Liz ; don’t let us quarrel : let us be reason- 
able and talk this over like brother and sister. It’s soon set 
right. All that need be done is for you to tell me at once 
that I may go home and tell Mr. Headstone that what has 
taken place is not final, and that it will all come right by- 
and-by.” 

The pale face looked anxiously and lovingly at him, but 
she shook her head. 

“ Can’t you speak ? ” said the boy, sharply. 

I am very unwilling to speak, Charley. If I must, I 
must. I cannot allow you to say any such thing to Mr. 
Headstone. Nothing remains to be said to him from me, 
after what I have said for good and all, to-night.” 

“ And this girl,” cried the boy, contemptuously throwing 
her off again, “ calls herself a sister ! ” 

“ Charley, dear, that is the second time that you have al- 
most struck me. Don’t be hurt by my words. I don’t 
mean — Heaven forbid! — that you intended it; but you 
hardly know with what a sudden swing you removed your- 
self from me.” 

‘‘ However I ” said the boy, taking no heed of the remon- 
strance, and pursuing his own mortified disappointment, “I 
know what this means, and you shall not disgrace me.” 

“ It means what I have told you, Charley, and nothing 
more.” 

That’s not true,” said the boy in a violent tone, “ and 
you know it’s not. It means your precious Mr. W ray burn ; 
that’s what it means. You are an inveterately bad girl, and 
a false sister, and I have done with you. For ever, I have 
done with you ! ” 

He threw up his ungrateful and ungracious hand as if it 
set up a barrier between them, and flung himself upon his 
heel and left her. She remained impassive on the same 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


171 


spot, silent and niotionless, until the striking of the church 
clock roused her, and she turned away. But then, with the 
breaking up of her immobility came the breaking up of the 
waters that the cold heart of the selfish boy had frozen. 
And “ 0 that I were lying here with the dead ! ” and “ 0 
Charley, Charley ! ” were all the words she said, as she laid 
her face in her hands on the stone coping. 

A figure passed by, and passed on. After hesitating a 
little, the figure turned back, and, advancing with an air 
of gentleness and compassion, said: “Pardon me, young 
woman, for speaking to you, but you are under some dis- 
tress of mind. Can I help you ? ” 

She raised her head at the sound of these kind words, and 
answered gladly, “ 0, Mr. Riah, is it you ? ” 

“ My daughter,” said the old man, “ I stand amazed ! I 
spoke as to a stranger. Take my arm, take my arm. What 
grieves you ? Who has done this ? Poor girl, poor girl ! ’ ’ 
“My brother has quarreled with me,” sobbed Lizzie, 
“ and renounced me.” 

“ He is a thankless dog,” said the Jew, angrily. “ Let him 
go. Shake the dust from thy feet and let him go. Come, 
daughter ! Come home with me — it is but across the road — 
and take a little time to recover your peace and to make 
your eyes seemly, and then I will bear you company 
through the streets.” 

She accepted the support he offered her, and they slowly 
passed out of the church-yard. They were in the act of 
emerging into the main thoroughfare, when another figure 
loitering discontentedly by, started and exclaimed, “ Lizzie I 
why, where have you been ? What is the matter ? ” 

“Mr. Wray burn, I cannot tell you now. I cannot tell 
you to-night, if I ever can tell you. Pray leave me.” 

“ But, Lizzie, I came expressly to join you. And I have 
been lingering about,” added Eugene, “like a bailiff; or,” 
with a look at Riah, “ an old clothesman.” 

“ Mr. Wray burn, pray, pray leave me with this protector. 
And one thing more, pray, pray be careful of yourself.” 

“If Mr. Aaron,” said Eugene, “will be good enough to 
relinquish his charge to me, he will be quite free for any 
engagement he may have at the Synagogue. Mr. Aaron, 
will you have the kindness ? ” 


172 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


‘‘ Christian gentleman,” replied the old man, calmly, “ I 
will hear only one voice to-night, desiring me to leave this 
damsel before I have conveyed her to her home. If she 
requests it, I will do it.” 

I do notask you,” said Lizzie, “ and I beg you take me 
home. Mr. Wray burn, I have had a bitter trial to-night, 
and I hope you will not think me ungrateful, or mysterious, 
or changeable. I am neither; I am wretched. Pray re- 
member what I said to you. Pray, pray, take care.” 

My dear Lizzie,” he returned, in a low voice, bending 
over her on the other side, of what ? Of whom ? ” 

“ Of any one you have lately seen and made angry.” 

He snapped his fingers and laughed. Come,” said he, 
‘‘ since no better may be, Mr. Aaron and I will divide this 
trust, and see you home together. Mr. Aaron on that side : 
I on this. If perfectly agreeable to Mr. Aaron, the escort 
will now proceed.” 

He knew his power over her, and going on at her side, so 
gayly, regardless of all that had been urged against him ; so 
superior in his salhes and seh-possession to the gloomy con- 
straint of her suitor and the selfish petulance of her brother ; 
so faithful to her, as it seemed, when her own stock was 
faithless ; what an immense advantage, what an overpower- 
ing influence, were his that night ! 

They went direct to Lizzie’s lodging. A httle short of 
the house-door she parted from them, and went in alone. 

CHAPTER XXX. 

I T is the first anniversary of the happy marriage of Mr. 
and Mrs. Lammle, and the celebration is a breakfast. 
Oftener than twice or thrice while breakfast is in pro- 
gress, Mr. Twemlow gives a little sudden turn towards Mrs. 
Lammle, and then says to her, “ I beg your pardon ! ” This 
not being Twemlow’s usual way, why is it his way to-day ? 
Why, the truth is, Twemlow repeatedly labors under the 
impression that Mrs. Lammle is going to speak To him, and 
turning finds that it is not so. 

Lady Tippins, partaking plentifully of the fruits of the 
earth (including grape-juice in the category), becomes live- 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


173 


lier, and applies herself to elicit sparks from Mortimer Light- 
wood. It is always understood among the initiated, that 
that faithless lover must be planted at table opposite to Lady 
Tippins, who will then strike conversational fire out of him. 
In a pause of mastication and deglutition, Lady Tippins, con- 
templating Mortimer, recalls that it was at our dear Veneer- 
ings, and in the presence of a party who are surely all here, 
that he told them his story of the man from somewhere, 
which afterwards became so horribly interesting and vulgar- 
ly popular. 

Yes, Lady Tippins,” dissents Mortimer ; “ as they say on 
the stage, Even so ! ” 

“ Then we expect you,” retorts the charmer, “ to sustain 
your reputation, and tell us something else.” 

‘‘ Lady Tippins, I exhausted myself for life that day. I 
assure you, I have nothing to tell.” But Eugene adding in a 
low voice, “ There, tell it, tell it ! ” he corrects himself with 
the addition, “ Nothing worth mentioning.” 

Boots and Brewer immediately perceive that it is im- 
mensely worth mentioning, and become politely clamorous. 
Yeneering is also visited by a perception to the same effect. 

“ Pray don’t be at the trouble of composing yourselves to 
listen,” says Mortimer Lightwood, ‘‘because I shall have 
finished long before you have fallen into comfortable atti- 
tudes. The reference which I suppose to be made by my 
honorable and fair enslaver opposite, is to the following cir- 
cumstance. Yery lately, the young woman, Lizzie Hexam, 
daughter of the late Jesse Hexam, otherwise Gaflfer, who 
will be remembered to have found the body of the man from 
somewhere, mysteriously received, she knew not from 
whom, an explicit retractation of the charges made against 
her father by another water-side character of the name of 
Biderhood. Nobody believed them, because Rogue Rider- 
hood had previously played fast and loose with the said 
charges, and, in fact, abandoned them. However, the retrac- 
tation I have mentioned found its way into Lizzie Hexam’s 
hands, with a general flavor on it of having been favored by 
some anonymous messenger in a dark cloak and slouched 
hat, and was by her forwarded, in her father’s vindication, to 
Mr. Boffin, my client, who hereupon desires his Secretary — 


174 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


art individual of the hermit-crab or oyster species, and whose 
name, I think, is Chokesmith — but it doesn’t in the least 
matter — say Artichoke — to put himself in communication 
with Lizzie Hex am. Artichoke professes his readiness so 
to do, endeavors to do so, but fails.” 

Why fails ? ” asks Boots. 

“ How fails ? ” asks Brewer. 

“ Pardon me,” returns Lightwood, ‘‘ I must postpone the 
reply for one moment, or we shall have an anti-climax. 
Artichoke failing signally, my client refers the task to me : 
his purpose being to advance the interests of the object of 
his search. I proceed to put myself in communication with 
her ; I even happen to possess some special means,” with a 
glance at Eugene, “ of putting myself in communication 
with her ; but I fail too, because she has vanished.” 

“ Vanished ! ” is the general echo. 

“ Disappeared,” says Mortimer. “ Hobody knows how, 
nobody knows when, nobody knows where. And so ends 
the story to which my honorable and fair enslaver opposite 
referred.” 

Twemlow once more turns involuntarily to Mrs. Lammle, 
not cured yet of that often recurring impression that she is 
going to speak to him. This time she really is going to speak 
to him. Y eneering is talking with his other next neighbor, 
and she speaks in a low voice.” 

“ Mr. Twemlow.” 

He answers, “ I beg your pardon ? Yes ? ” Still a little 
doubtful, because of her not looking at him. 

“ You have the soul of a gentleman, and I know I may 
« trust you. Will you give me the opportunity of saying a 
few words to you when you come up-stairs ? ” 

Assuredly. I shall be honored.” 

‘‘ Don’t seem to do so, if you please, and don’t think, it in- 
consistent if my manner should be more careless than my 
words. Imay be watched.” 

In the drawing-room, groups form as usual. Mrs. Lammle, 
on a sofa by a table, invites Mr. Twemlow’s attention to a 
book of portraits in her hand. 

Mr. Twemlow takes his station on a settee before her, and 
Mrs. Lammle shows him a portrait. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


175 


“You have reason to be surprised,” she says, softly, “ but 
I wish you wouldn’t look so. I think, you never saw that 
distant connection of yours before to-day ? ” 

“ No, never.” 

“ Now that you do see him, you see what he is. You are 
not proud of him ? ” 

“ To say the truth, Mrs. Lammle, no.” 

“ If you knew more of him, you would be less inclined ter 
acknowledge him. Here is another portrait. What do you 
think of it?” 

Twemlow has just presence of mind enough to say aloud : 

“ Very like ! Uncommonly like ! ” 

“ So like as to be almost a caricature ? — Mr. Twemlow, it 
is impossible to tell you what the struggle in my mind has 
been, before I could bring myself to speak to you as I do 
now. It is only in the conviction that I may trust you nev- 
er to betray me, that I can proceed. Sincerely promise me 
that you never will betray my confidence — that you will re- 
spect it, even though you may no longer respect me, — and I 
shall be as satisfied as if you had sworn it.” 

“ Madam, on the honor of a poor gentleman — ” 

“ Thank you. I can desire no more. Mr. Twemlow, I 
implore you to save G-eorgiana. She will be sacrificed. 
She will be inveigled and married to that connection of 
yours. It is a partnership affair, a money-speculation. She 
has no strength of will or character to help herself, and she 
is on the brink of being sold into wretchedness for life.” 

“ Amazing ! But what can I do to prevent it ? ” demands 
Twemlow, shocked and bewildered to the last degree. 

“ Here is another portrait. And not good, is it ? ” 

Aghast at the light manner of her throwing her head back ’ 
to look at it critically, Twemlow still dimly perceives the ex- 
pediency of throwing his own head back, and does so. 
Though he no more sees the portrait than if it were in China. 

“Decidedly not good,” said Mrs. Lammle. “Stiff and 
exaggerated ! ” 

“And ex — ” But Twemlow, in his demolished state, 
cannot command the word, and trails off into “ — actly so.” 

“ Mr. Twemlow, your word will have weight with her 
pompous, self -blinded father. You know how much he 
makes of your family. Lose no time. W arn him.” 


176 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Bat warn him against whom ? ” 

“ Against me.” 

By great good fortune Twemlow receives a stimulant at 
this critical instant. The stimulant is Lammle’s voice. 

“ Sophronia, my dear, what portraits are you showing 
Twemlow ? ” 

“ Public characters, Alfred.” 

‘‘ Show him the last of me.” 

“ Yes, AKred.” 

She puts the book down, takes another book up, turns the 
leaves, and presents the portrait to Twemlow. 

“ That is the last of Mr. Lammle. Do you think it good ? 
— W arn her father against me. I deserve it, for I have been 
in the scheme from the first. It is my husband’s scheme, 
your connection’s, and mine. I tell you this, only to show 
you the necessity of the poor little foolish affectionate creat- 
ure’s being befriended and rescued. You will not repeat 
this to her father. You will spare me so far, and spare my 
husband. For, though this celebration of to-day is all a 
mockery, he is my husband, and we must live. — Do you 
think it like ? ” 

“Very well indeed!” are at length the words which 
Twemlow with great difficulty extracts from himself. 

“lam glad you think so. On the whole, I myself consid- 
er it the best. The others are so dark. Now here, for in- 
stance, is another of Mr. Lammle — Tell him I am a match- 
maker; tell him I am an artful and designing woman; tell 
him you are sure his daughter is best out of my house and 
my company. Tell him any such things of me ; they will all 
be true. — Alfred, Mr. Twemlow thinks the last one the best, 
and quite agrees with you and me.” 

Alfred advances. The groups break up. Then good-bye 
and good-bye. 


CHAPTER XXXL 

M r. and MRS. WILDER had seen a full quarter of a 
hundred more anniversaries of their wedding day than 
Mr. and Mrs. Lammle had seen of theirs, but they still cele- 
brated the occasion in the bosom of their family. Not that 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


177 


these celebrations ever resulted in anything particularly 
agreeable, or that the family was ever disappointed by that 
circumstance on account of having looked forward to the re- 
turn of the auspicious day with sanguine anticipations of en- 
joyment. It was kept morally, rather as a Fast than a Feast, 
enabling Mrs. Wilfer to hold a sombre darkling state which 
exhibited that impressive woman in her choicest colors. 

The revolving year having brought the day once more, 
Bella had arrived with tokens from Mrs. Boffin which had 
materially assisted in beguiling the rosy hours until it was 
time for her to have Pa’s escort back. The dimples duly 
tied up in the bonnet-strings and the leave-taking done, they 
got out into the air, and the cherub drew a long breath as if 
he found it refreshing. 

“ W ell, dear Pa,” said Bella, “ the anniversary may be con- 
sidered over.” 

Yes, my dear, there’s another of ’em gone.” 

Bella drew his arm closer through hers as they walked 
along, and gave it a number of consolatory pats. “ Thank 
you, my dear,” he said, as if she had spoken ; I am all right, 
my dear. W ell, and how do you get on, Bella ? ” 

‘‘ I am not at all improved. Pa.” 

Ain’t you really, though ? ” 

‘‘ No, Pa. On the contrary, I am worse.” 

Lor ! ” said the cherub. 

I am worse. Pa. I make so many calculations, how 
much a year I must have when I marry, and what is the least 
I can manage to do with, that I am beginning to get wrinkles 
over my nose. Did you notice any wrinkles over my nose 
this evening. Pa ? ” 

Pa laughing at this, Bella gave him two or three shakes. 
She then laid the little forefinger of her right glove on her lip, 
and then laid it on her father’s lip — “ that ’s a kiss for you. 
And now I am going seriously to tell you— let me see how 
many — four secrets. Mind ! Serious, grave, weighty se- 
crets. Strictly between ourselves.” 

“ Number one, my dear ? ” 

“ Number one,” said Bella, will electrify you. Pa. Who 
do think has ” — she was confused here in spite of her merry 
way of beginning — “ has made an offer to me ? ” 

12 


178 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Pa looked in her face, and looked at the ground, and 
looked in her face again, and declared he could never guess. 

Mr. Rokesmith.” 

“You don’t tell me so, my dear ! ” 

“ Mis — ter Roke — smith, Pa,” said Bella, separating the 
syllables for emphasis. “ What do you say to that f ” 

Pa answered quietly with the counter-question, “ What 
did you say to that, my love ? ” 

“ I said No,” returned Bella, sharply. “ Of course.” 

“Yes. Of course,” said her father, meditating. “ Num- 
ber two, my dear ? ” 

“ Number two. Pa, is much to the same purpose, though 
not so preposterous. Mr. Lightwood would propose to me, 
if I would let him.” 

“ Then I understand, my dear, that you don’t intend to let 
him ? ” 

Bella again saying, “ Why, of course not ! ” her father felt 
himself bound to echo, “ Of course not.” 

“ I don’t care for him,” said Bella. 

“ That’s enough,” her father interposed. 

“ No, Pa, it’s not enough,” rejoined Bella, giving him an- 
other shake or two. “ Haven’t I told you what a mercenary 
little wretch I am ? It only becomes enough when he has 
no money, and no clients, and no expectations, and no any- 
thing but debts.” 

“Hah! ” said the cherub, a little depressed. “Number 
three, my dear? ” 

“ Number three. Pa, is a better thing. A generous thing, 
a noble thing, a delightful thing. Mrs. Boffin has herself 
told me, as a secret, with her own kind lips — and truer lips 
never opened or closed in this life, I am sure — that they wish 
to see me well married; and that when I marry with their 
consent they will portion me most handsomely.” Here the 
grateful girl burst out crying very heartily. 

“ Don’t cry, my darling,” said her father, with his hand to 
his eyes ; “ it ’s excusable in me to be a little overcome when 
I find that my dear favorite child is, after all disappoint- 
ments, to be so provided for and so raised in the world ; but 
don’t you cry, don’t you cry. I am very thankful. I con- 
gratulate you with all my heart, my dear. Number four, 
my dear ? ” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


179 


Bella’s countenance fell in the midst of her mirth. ‘‘ Aft- 
er all, perhaps I had better put off number four, Pa. Let 
me try once more, if for never so short a time, to hope that it 
may not really be so.” 

The change in her strengthened the cherub’s interest in 
number four, and he said quietly : “ May not be so, my dear ? 
May not be how, my dear ? ” 

Bella looked at him pensively, and shook her head. 

“ Oh, Pa, there is no good in number four ! I am so sorry 
for it, I am so unwilling to believe it, I have tried so earnest- 
ly not to see it, that it is very hard to tell, even to you. But 
Mr. Boffin is being spoiled by prosperity, and is changing 
every day.” 

“ My dear Bella, I hope and trust not.” 

“ I have hoped and trusted not too. Pa ; but every day he 
changes for the worse, and for the worse. Not to me — he is 
always much the same to me — but to others about him. Be- 
fore my eyes he grows suspicious, capricious, hard, tyrannic- 
al, unjust. If ever a good man were ruined by good fort- 
une, it is my benefactor. And yet. Pa, think how terrible 
the fascination of money is ! I see this, and hate this, and 
dread this, and don’t know but that money might make a 
much worse change in me. And yet I have money always 
in my thoughts and my desires ; and the whole life I place 
before myself is money, money, money, and what money 
can make of life ! ” 


CHAPTER XXXII. 


ERE Bella Wilfer’s bright and ready little wits at 



yv fault, or was the Grolden Dustman passing through 
the furnace of proof and coming out dross ? 

On that very night of her return from the Happy Return, 
something chanced which Bella closely followed with her 
eyes and ears. There was an apartment at the side of the 
Boffin mansion, known as Mr. Boffin’s room. Far less grand 
than the rest of the house, it was far more comfortable. 

Mr. and Mrs. Boffin were reported sitting in this room, 
when Bella got back. Entering it, she found the Secretary 
there too ; in official attendance it would appear, for he was 


180 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


standing with some papers in his hand by a table with shaded 
candles on it, at which Mr. Boffin was seated thrown back in 
his easy chair. 

“ You are busy, sir,” said Bella, hesitating at the door. 

Not at all, my dear, not at all. Youhe one of ourselves. 
Come in, come in. Here’s the old lady in her usual place.” 

Mrs. Boffin adding her nod and smile of welcome to Mr. 
Boffin’s words, Bella took her book to a chair in the fireside 
corner, by Mrs. Boffin’s work-table. Mr. Boffin’s station 
was on the opposite side. 

“ Now, Rokesmith,” said the Grolden Dustman, so sharply 
rapping the table to bespeak his attention as Bella turned the 
leaves of her book, that she started ; “ where were we ? ” 

“ You were saying, sir,” returned the Secretary, with an 
air of some reluctance and a glance towards those others 
who were present, that you considered the time had come 
for fixing my salary.” 

“ Don’t be above calling it wages, man,” said Mr. Boffin, 
testily. “ What the deuce ! I never talked of my salary 
when I was in service.” 

“ My wages,” said the Secretary, correcting himseU. 

“Now, concerning these same wages,” said Mr. Boffin. 
“ Sit down. Now, I’ve gone into the matter, and I say two 
hundred a year. What do you think of it ? Do you think 
it’s enough ? ” 

“ Thank you. It is a fair proposal.” 

“I don’t say, you know,” Mr. Boffin stipulated, “ but 
what it may be more than enough. And I’ll tell you why, 
Rokesmith. A man of property, like me, is bound to con- 
sider the market price. At first I didn’t enter into that as 
much as I might have done ; but I’ve got acquainted with 
other men of property since, and I’ve got acquainted with 
the duties of property. A sheep is worth so much in the 
market, and I ought to give it and no more. A secretary 
is worth so much in the market, and I ought to give it and 
no more. But I don’t mind stretching a point with you.” 

“Mr. Boffin, you are very good,” replied the Secretary. 

“ Then we put the figure,” said Mr. Boffin, “ at two hun- 
dred a year. Then the figure’s disposed of. Now, there 
must be no misunderstanding regarding what I buy for two 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


181 


hundred a year. If I pay for a sheep, I buy it out and out. 
Similarly, if I pay for a secretary, I buy Mm out and out.” 

“ In other words, you purchase my whole time ? ” 

“Certainly I do. Look here,” said Mr. BofFin, “it ain’t 
that I want to occupy your whole time ; you can take up a 
book for a minute or two when you’ve nothing better to do, 
though I think you’ll a’most always find something useful to 
do. But I want to keep you in attendance. Therefore, 
betwixt your breakfast and your supper, on the premises I 
expect to find you. If you want leave, ask for it.” 

Again the Secretary bowed. His manner was uneasy 
and astonished, and showed a sense of humiliation. 

“ I’ll have a bell,” said Mr. Boffin, “ hung from this room 
to yours, and when I want you. I’ll touch it. I don’t call to 
mind that I have anything more to say at present.” 

The Secretary rose, gathered up his papers, and with- 
drew. Bella’s eyes followed him to the door, lighted on Mr. 
Boffin complacently throAvn back in his easy chair, and 
drooped over her book. 

“ I have let that chap, that young man of mine,” said Mr. 
Boffin, taking a trot up and down the room', “ get above his 
work. It won’t do. I must have him down a peg. A man 
of property owes a duty to other men of property, and must 
look sharp after his inferiors. ’ ’ 

Bella felt that Mrs. Boffin was not comfortable, and that 
the eyes of that good creature sought to discover from her 
face what attention she had given to this discourse, and 
what impression it had made upon her. For which reason 
Bella’s eyes drooped more engrossedly over her book, and 
she turned the page with an air of profound absorption in it. 

“ Noddy,” said Mrs. Boffin, after thoughtfully pausing in 
her work. 

“ My dear,” returned the Golden Dustman, stopping short 
in his trot. 

“Excuse my puttipg it to you. Noddy, but now really! 
Haven’t you been a little strict with Mr. Rokesmith to- 
night? Haven’t you been a little — -just a little little — not 
quite like your old self ? ” 

“ Why, old woman, I hope so,” returned Mr. Boffin, 
cheerfully, if not boastfully. 


182 


CO^WEI^SED CLASSICS. 


“ Hope so, deary ? ” 

“ Our old selves wouldn’t do here, old lady. Haven’t you 
found that out yet ? Our old selves would be fit for noth- 
ing here but to be robbed and imposed upon. Our old selves 
weren’t people of fortune ; our new selves are ; it’s a great 
difterence.” 

“ Ah ! ” said Mrs. Boffin, pausing in her work again, soft- 
ly to draw a long breath and to look at the fire. “ A great 
difference.” 

“As to Rokesmith, that young man of mine,” said Mr. 
Boffin, “it’s the same with him as with the footmen. I have 
found out that you must either scrunch them, or let them 
scrunch you. If you ain’t imperious with ’em, they won’t 
believe in your being any better than themselves, if as good, 
after the stories (lies mostly) that they have heard of your 
beginnings. There’s nothing betwixt stiffening yourself up, 
and throwing yourself away ; take my word for that, old 
lady.” 

Bella ventured for a moment to look stealthily towards 
him under her eyelashes, and she saw a dark cloud of sus- 
picion, covetousness, and conceit, overshadowing the once 
open face. 

“Hows’ ever,” said he, “this isn’t entertaining to Miss 
Bella. Is it Bella?” 

A deceiving Bella she was, to look at him with that pen- 
sively abstracted air, as if her mind were full of her book 
and she had not heard a single word I 

“ Hah! Better employed than to attend to it,” said Mr. 
Boffin. “ That’s right, that’s right. Especially as you have 
no call to be told how to value yourself, my dear.” 

Coloring a little under this compliment, Bella returned^ 
“ I hope, sir, you don’t think me vain ? ” 

“ Hot a bit, my dear,” said Mr. Boffin. “ But I think it’s 
very creditable in you, at your age, to be so well up with the 
pace of the world, and to know what to go in for. Y ou are 
right. Gfo in for money, my love. Money’s the article. 
You’ll make money of your good looks, and of the money 
Mrs. Boffin and me will have the pleasure of settling upon 
you, and you’ll live and die rich. That’s the state to live and 
die in 1 ” said Mr. Boffin, in an unctuous manner. “ R — r — 
rich!” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


183 


Somehow, Bella was not so well pleased with this as- 
surance and this prospect as she might have been. Some- 
how, when she put her arms round Mrs. Boffin’s neck and 
said Grood-Night, she derived a sense of unworthiness from 
the still anxious face of that good woman and her obvious 
wish to excuse her husband. 

Mr. Boffin’s interest began to centre in book-shops ; and 
more than that — for that of itself would not have been much 
— in one exceptional kind of book. 

“ Look in here, my dear,” Mr. Boffin would say, checking 
Bella’s arm at a bookseller’s window; “you can read at 
sight, and your eyes are as sharp as they’re bright. N^ow, 
look well about you, my dear, and tell me if you see any book 
about a Miser.” 

If Bella saw such a book, Mr. Boffin would instantly dart 
in and buy it. And still, as if they had not found it, they 
would seek out another book-shop, and Mr. Boffin would 
say, “How, look well all round, my dear, for a Life of a 
Miser, or any book of that sort ; any Lives of odd characters 
who may have been Misers.” 

Bella would examine the window with the greatest atten- 
tion, while Mr. Boffin would examine her face. The mo- 
ment she pointed out any book as being entitled Lives of 
eccentric personages. Anecdotes of strange characters. Rec- 
ords of remarkable individuals, or anything to that purpose, 
Mr. Boffin’s countenance would light up, and he would in- 
stantly dart in and buy it. Size, price, quality, were of no 
account. Any book that seemed to promise a chance of 
miserly biography, Mr. Boffin purchased without a mo- 
ment’s delay and carried home. Happening to be informed 
by a bookseller that a portion of the Annual Register was 
devoted to “ Characters,” Mr. Boffin at once bought a whole 
set of that ingenious compilation, and began to carry it home 
piecemeal, confiding a volume to Bella, and bearing three 
himself. The completion of this labor occupied them about 
a fortnight. When the task was done, Mr. Boffin, with his 
appetite for Misers whetted instead of satiated, began to 
look out again. 

While these occurrences were in progress, Mrs. Lammle 
made the discovery that Bella had a fascinating influence 


184 


CONDENSED CLASSICS 


over her. The Lammles, originally presented by the dear 
Yeneerings, visited the Boffins on all grand occasions, and 
Mrs. Lammle took the friendhest interest in Bella’s making a 
good match. 

“ I fear, Bella dear,” said Mrs. Lammle one day, “ that you 
will be very hard to please.” 

“ I don’t expect to be pleased, dear,” said Bella, with a 
languid turn of her eyes. 

Truly, my love,” returned Sophronia, shaking her head, 
and smiling her best smile, ‘‘it would not be very easy to 
find a man worthy of your attractions.” 

“ The question is not a man, my dear,” said Bella, coolly, 
“ but an establishment.” 

“My love,” returned Mrs. Lammle, “your prudence 
amazes me — where did you study life so well! — you are 
right. In such a case as yours, the object is a fitting estab- 
hshment. Y ou could not descend to an inadequate one from 
Mrs. Boffin’s house, and even if your beauty alone could not 
command it, it is to be assumed that Mr. and Mrs. Boffin 
will — ” 

“ Oh ! they have already,” Bella interposed. 

“jSTo! Have they really ? ” 

A little vexed by a suspicion that she had spoken pre- 
cipitately, and withal a little defiant of her own vexation, 
Bella determined not to retreat. 

“ That is to say,” she explained, “ they have told me they 
mean to portion me as their adopted child, if you mean that. 
But don’t mention it.” 

“ Mention it I ” replied Mrs. Lammle, as if she were full of 
awakened feelins: at the suggestion of such an impossibihty. 
“ Men-tion it I ” 

On one point connected with the watch she kept on Mr. 
Boffin, Bella felt very inquisitive, and that was the question 
whether the Secretary watched him too, and followed the 
sure and steady change in him, as she did. Her very limit- 
ed intercourse with Mr. Rokesmith rendered this hard to 
find out. Their communication now, at no time extended 
beyond the preservation of commonplace appearances be- 
fore Mr. and Mrs. Boffin ; and if Bella and the Secretary 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


185 


were ever left alone together by any chance, he immediately 
withdrew. She consulted his face when she could do so 
covertly, as she worked or read, and could make nothing of 
it. He looked subdued ; but he had acquired a strong com- 
mand of feature, and whenever Mr. Boffin spoke to him in 
Bella’s presence, or whatever revelation of himself Mr. Bof- 
fin made, the Secretary’s face changed no more than a wall. 

The worst of the matter was, that it thus fell out insensi- 
bly — and most provokingly, as Bella complained to herself, 
in her impetuous little manner — -that her observation of Mr. 
Boffin involved a continual observation of Mr. Rokesmith. 
“Won’t that extract a look from him ? ” — “ Can it be possi- 
ble that makes no impression on him?” Such questions 
Bella would propose to herself, often as many times in a day 
as there were hours in it. 

“ Can he be so base as to sell his very nature for two hun- 
dred a year?” Bella would think. And then, “But why 
not ? It’s a mere question of price with others beside him. 
I suppose I would sell mine, if I could get enough for it.” 
And so she came round again to the war with herself. 

“ Rokesmith,” said Mr. Boffin one evening when they 
were all in his room again, and he and the Secretary had 
been going over some accounts, “ I am spending too much 
money. Or leastways, you are spending too much for me.” 

“You are rich, sir.” 

“ I am not,” said Mr. Boffin. 

The sharpness of the retort brought no change of expres- 
sion into the Secretary’s face. 

“I tell you I am not rich,” repeated Mr. Boffin, “and I 
won’t have it.” 

“You are not rich, sir ? ” repeated the Secretary. 

“ Well,” returned Mr. Boffin, “ if I am, that’s my business. 
I am not going to spend at this rate, to please you, or any- 
body. You wouldn’t like it, if it was your money.” 

“ Even in that impossible case, sir, 1 — ” 

“ Hold your tongue ! ” said Mr. Boffin. “ You oughtn’t to 
hke it in any case. There ! I didn’t mean to be rude, but 
you put me out so, and after all I’m master. I didn’t intend 
to tell you to hold your tongue. I beg your pardon. Don’t 
hold your tongue. Only, don’t contradict. Have you given 
notice to quit your lodgings ? ” 


186 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Under your direction, I have, sir.” 

“ Then I tell you what,” said Mr. Boffin ; “ pay the quar- 
ter’s rent — pay the quarter’s rent, it’ll be the cheapest thing 
in the end — and come hdre at once, so that you may be al- 
ways on the spot, day and night, and keep the expenses 
down. You’ll charge the quarter’s rent to me, and we must 
try and save it somewhere. You’ve got some lovely furni- 
ture; haven’t you?” 

The furniture in my rooms is my own.” 

“ Then we shan’t have to buy any for you. In case you 
was to think it,” said Mr. Boffin, with a look of peculiar 
shrewdness, ‘‘ so honorably independent in you as to make 
it a relief to your mind, to make that furniture over to me in 
the light of a set-off against the quarter’s rent, why, ease 
your mind, ease your mind. I don’t ask it, but I won’t stand 
in your way if you should consider it due to yourself. As to 
your room, choose any empty room at the top of the house.” 

“ Any empty room will do for me,” said the Secretary. 

You can take your pick,” said Mr. Boffin, “ and it’ll be as 
good as eight or ten shillings a week added to your income. 
I won’t deduct for it ; I look to you to make it up handsome- 
ly by keeping the expenses down. Now I’ll come to your 
office-room and dispose of a letter or two.” 

On that clear, generous face of Mrs. Boffin’s, Bella had 
seen such traces of a pang at the heart while this dialogue 
was being held, that she had not the courage to turn her eyes 
to it when they were left alone. Feigning to be intent on 
her embroidery, she sat plying her needle until her busy 
hand was stopped by Mrs. Boffin’s hand being lightly laid 
upon it. Yielding to the touch, she felt her hand carried to 
the good soul’s lips, and felt a tear fall on it. 

“Oh, my loved husband! ” said Mrs. Boffin. “This is 
hard to see and hear. But my dear Bella, believe me that in 
spite of all the change in him, he is the best of men.” 

He came back at the moment when Bella had taken the 
hand comfortingly between her own. 

“Eh?” said he, mistrustfully looking in at the door. 
“ What’s she telling you ? ” 

“ She’s only praising you, sir ? ” said Bella. 

“Praising me? You are sure? Not blaming me foi 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


187 


standing on my own defense against a crew of plunderers, 
who would suck me dry by driblets ? Not blaming me for 
getting a little hoard together ? ” 

He came up to them, and his wife folded her hands upon 
his shoulder, and shook her head, as she laid it on her hands. 

“ There, there, there I Don’t take on, old lady.” 

“ But I can’t bear to see you so, my dear.” 

“ Nonsense ! Eecollect, we are not our old selves. Recol- 
lect, we must scrunch or be scrunched. Recollect, we must 
hold our own. Recollect, money makes money. Don’t 
you be uneasy, Bella, my child ; don’t you be doubtful. The 
more I save, the more you shall have.” 

CHAPTER XXXIII. 

M r. SILAS WEG-Gr now rarely attended the minion of 
fortune and the worm of the hour, at his (the worm’s 
and minion’s) own house, but lay under general instructions 
to await him within a certain margin of hours at the Bower. 
Mr. W egg took this arrangement in great dudgeon, because 
the appointed hours were evening hours, and those he con- 
sidered precious to the progress of the friendly move. But 
it was quite in character, he bitterly remarked to Mr. Y enus, 
that the upstart who had trampled on those eminent creat- 
ures, Miss Elizabeth, Master (George, Aunt Jane, and Uncle 
Parker, should oppress his literary man. 

One evening, when he had grown accustomed to the ar- 
rival of his patron in a cab, accompanied by some profane 
historian charged with unutterable names of incomprehensi- 
ble peoples, of impossible descent, waging wars any number 
of years and syllables long, and carrying illimitable hosts and 
riches about, with the greatest ease, beyond the confines of 
geography — one evening the usual time passed by, and no 
patron appeared. After half an hour’s grace, Mr. Wegg 
proceeded to the outer gate, and there executed a whistle, 
conveying to Mr. Yenus, if perchance within hearing, the 
tidings of his being at home and disengaged. Forth from 
the shelter of a neighboring wall, Mr. Yenus then emerged. 

“ Brother in arms,” said Mr. Wegg, “ welcome ! ” 

Mr Yenus gave him a rather dry good-evening. 


188 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Walk in, brother,” said Silas, clapping him on the shoul- 
der, “ and take your seat in my chimbley corner ; for what 
says the ballad ? 

* No malice to dread, sir, 

And no falsehood to fear. 

But truth to delight me, Mr. Venus, 

And I forget what to cheer. 

Li toddle dee om dee. 

And something to guide, 

My ain fireside, sir, 

My ain fireside.’ ” 

With this quotation (depending for its neatness rather on 
the spirit than the words;, Mr. Wegg conducted his guest to 
his hearth. 

“We’ll devote the evening, brother,” he exclaimed, “to 
prosecute our friendly move.” 

“ Why, as to the friendly move, one of my objections to it 
is, that it don't move.” 

“ Rome, brother,” returned Wegg : “ a city which (it may 
not be generally known) originated in twins and a wolf, and 
ended in Imperial marble : wasn’t built in a day.” 

“ Did I say it was ? ” asked Yenus. 

“No, you did not, brother. W ell inquired.” 

“ But I do say,” proceeded Yenus, “ that I am taken from 
among my trophies of anatomy, am called upon to exchange 
my human warious for mere coal-ashes warious, and noth- 
ing comes of it. I think I must give up.” 

“ No, sir ! ” remonstrated W egg. “No, sir. 

‘Charge, Chester, charge. 

On, Mr Venus, on ! ’ 

Never say die, sir ! A man of your mark ! ” 

“ It's not so much saying it that I object to,” returned Mr. 
Yenus, “ as doing it. And having got to do it whether or 
no, I can’t afford to waste my time on groping for nothing in 
cinders. There’s no encouragement to go on.” 

“ Not them Mounds without,” said Mr. Wegg, extending 
his right hand with an air of solemn reasoning, “ encourage- 
ment ? Not them Mounds now looking down upon us ? ” 

“ They’re too big,” grumbled Yenus. “ What’s a scratch 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


189 


here and a scrape there, a poke in this place and a dig in the 
other, to them ? Besides ; what have we found ? ” 

“What have we found?” cried Wegg, delighted to be 
able to acquiesce. “Ah! There I grant you, comrade. 
Nothing. But on the contrary, comrade, what may we find ? 
There you’ll grant me. Anything.” 

“Isn’t your own Mr. Boffin well acquainted with the 
Mounds? And wasn’t he well acquainted with the de- 
ceased and his ways ? And has he ever showed any expec- 
tation of finding anything ? ” 

At that moment wheels were heard. 

“ Now, I should be loath,” said Mr. Wegg, with an air of 
patient injury, “ to think so ill of him as to suppose him capa- 
ble of coming at this time of night. Yet it sounds like him.” 

A ring at the yard bell. 

“ It is him,” said Mr. W egg, “ and he is capable of it. I am 
sorry, because I could have wished to keep up a little linger- 
ing fragment of respect for him.” 

Here Mr. Boffin was heard lustily calling at the yard gate, 
“ Halloa 1 W egg 1 Halloa 1 ” 

“ Keep your seat, Mr. Yenus,” said Wegg. “ He may not 
stop.” And then called out, “ Halloa, sir I Halloa! I’m 
with you directly, sir ! Half a minute, Mr. Boffin. Com- 
ing, sir, as fast as my leg will bring me ! ” And so with a 
show of much cheerful alacrity stumped out to the gate with 
a light, and there, through the window of a cab, descried Mr. 
Boffin inside, blocked up with books. 

Not ceasing to talk and bustle, in a state of great excite- 
ment, Mr. Boffin directed the removal and arrangement of 
the books, appearing to be in some sort beside himself until 
they were all deposited on the floor, and the cab was dis- 
missed. 

“ There ! ” said Mr. Boffin, gloating over them. “ There 
they are, like the four-and- twenty fiddlers — all of a row. 
G-et on your spectacles, Wegg; I know where to find the 
best of ’em, and we’ll have a taste at once of what we have 
got before us. What’s your friend’s name ? ” 

Mr. W egg presented his friend as Mr. Y enus. 

“ Eh ? ” cried Mr. Boffin. “ Of Clerkenwell ? ” 

“ Of Clerkenwell, sir,” said Mr. Yenus. 


190 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Why, I’ve heard of you,” cried Mr. Boffin. “ I heard of 
you in the old man’s time. You knew him. Did you ever 
buy anything of him ? ” With piercing eagerness. 

“No, sir,” returned Yenus. 

“ But he showed you things ; didn’t he ? ” 

Mr. Y enus, with a glance at his friend, replied in the af- 
firmative. 

“ What did he show you ? ” asked Mr. Boffin, putting his 
hands behind him, and eagerly advancing his head. “ Did 
he show you boxes, little cabinets, pocket-books, parcels, 
anything locked or sealed, anything tied up ? ” 

Mr. Y enus shook his head. 

“ Are you a judge of china ? ” 

Mr. Y enus again shook his head. 

“ Because if he had ever showed you a tea-pot, I should be 
glad to know of it,” said Mr. Boffin. And then with his 
right hand at his lips, repeated thoughtfully, “ a Tea-pot, a 
Tea-pot,” and glanced over the books on the floor, as if he 
knew there was something interesting connected with a 
tea-pot, somewhere among them. Producing a little book 
from his breast-pocket, he handed it with great care to the 
literary gentleman, and inquired, “ What do you call that, 
Wegg?” ... 

“ This, sir,” replied Silas, adjusting his spectacles, and re- 
ferring to the title-page, “ is Merry weather’s Lives and An- 
ecdotes of Misers.” 

“ Y^hich of ’em have you got in that lot ? ” asked Mr. Bof- 
fin. “ Can you find out pretty easy ? ” 

“ Well, sir,” replied Silas, turning to the table of contents 
and slowly fluttering the leaves of the book, “ I should say 
they must be pretty well all here, sir ; here’s a large assort- 
ment, sir; my eye catches John Overs, sir, John Little, sir, 
Dick Jarrel, John Elwes, the Reverend Mr. Jones of BIcav- 
bury, Yulture Hopkins, Daniel Dancer — ” 

“ (Jive us Dancer, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin. 

“ Page a hundred and nine, Mr. Boffin. Chapter eight 
Contents of chapter, ‘ His birth and estate. His garments 
and outAvard appearance. Miss Dancer and her feminine 
graces. The Miser's Mansion. The finding of a treasure. 
The Story of the Mutton Pies. A Miser’s Idea c £ Death. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


191 


Bob, the Miser’s cur. G-riffiths and his Master. How to 
turn a penny. A substitute for a Fire. The Advantages of 
keeping a Snuft-box. The Miser dies without a Shirt. The 
Treasures of a Dunghill — ’ ” 

“ Eh ? What’s that ? ” demanded Mr. Boffin. 
a I Treasures,’ sir,” repeated Silas, reading very dis- 
tinctly, ‘^‘of a Dunghill.’ Mr. Venus, sir, would you 
obleege with the snuffers ? ” This, to secure attention to his 
adding with his lips only, “ Mounds ! ” 

Mr. Boffin drew an arm-chair into the space wffiere he 
stood, and said, seating himself and slyly rubbing his hands : 

Give us Dancer.” 

Mr. Wegg pursued the biography of that eminent man 
through its various phases of avarice and dirt, after which he 
read on as follows : 

“ ‘ The house, or rather the heap of ruins, in which Mr. 
Dancer lived, and which at his death devolved to the right of 
Captain Holmes, was a most miserable, decayed building, 
for it had not been repaired for more than half a century. 
But though poor in external structure, the ruinous fabric 
was very rich in the interior. One of Mr. Dancer’s richest 
escritoires was found to be a dungheap in the cowhouse ; a 
sum but little short of two thousand five hundred pounds 
was contained in this rich piece of manure ; and in an old 
jacket, carefully tied, and strongly nailed down to the man- 
ger, in bank notes and gold were found five hundred pounds 
more. Several bowls were discovered filled with guineas 
and half-guineas ; and at different times on searching the 
corners of the house they found various parcels of bank 
notes. Some were crammed into the crevices of the w'all ; 
bundles were hid under the cushions and covers of the 
chairs ; some were reposing snugly at the back of the draw- 
ers ; and notes amounting to six hundred pounds were found 
neatly doubled up in the inside of an old tea-pot. In the 
stable the Captain found jugs full of old dollars and shillings. 
The chimney was not left unsearched, and paid very well for 
the trouble ; for in nineteen different holes, all filled with 
soot, were found various sums of money, amounting to- 
gether to more than two hundred pounds.’ ” 

“ Let’s have some more,” said Mr. Boffin, hungrily. “ Do 
you like it ? ” he asked, turning suddenly to Mr. Venus. 


192 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Mr. Venus answered that he found it very interesting. 

“Then come again,” said Mr. Boffin, “and hear some 
more. Come when you like ; come the day after to-mor- 
row, half an hour sooner. There’s plenty more ; there’s no 
end to it. It’s wonderful what’s been hid, at one time or 
another,” said Mr. Boffin, ruminating ; “ money. Ah I And 
papers.” 

Mr. Wegg, in a languid transport, dropped over on Mr. 
V enus, and recovering himself, masked his emotions with a 
sneeze. 

“ Tish-ho ! Did you say papers too, sir ? Hidden, sir ? ” 

“ Hidden and forgot,” said Mr. Boffin. “ Men put away 
and forget, or mean to destroy, and don’t ! ” He then added 
in a slow tone, “As — ton — ish — ingl ” And as he rolled 
his eyes all round the room, W egg and Y enus hkewise rolled 
their eyes all round the room. 

“ However, time’s up for to-night,” said Mr. Boffin, wav- 
ing his hand after a silence. “ More the day after to-mor- 
row. Range the books upon the shelves, Wegg. I dare 
say, Mr. Y enus will be so kind as to help you.” 

While speaking, he thrust his hand into the breast of his 
outer coat, and struggled with some object that was too large 
to be got out easily. What was the stupefaction of the 
friendly movers when this object at last emerging, proved to 
be a much-dilapidated dark lantern I 

Without at all noticing the effect produced by this little 
instrument, Mr. Boffin stood it on his knee, and, producing a 
box of matches, deliberately lighted the candle in the lantern, 
blew out the kindled match, and cast the end into the fire. 
“I’m going, Wegg,” he then announced, “to take a turn 
about the place and round the yard. I don’t want you. Me 
and this same lantern have taken hundreds — thousands of 
such turns in our time together.” 

W egg had nothing for it but to let Mr. Boffin go out and 
shut the door behind him. But, the instant he was on the 
other side of it, W egg clutched Y enus with both hands, and 
said in a choking whisper, as if he were being strangled : 

“ Mr. Yenus, he must be followed, he must be watched, he 
mustn’t be lost sight of for a moment.” 

“ Why mustn’t he ? ” asked Mr. V enus, also strangling. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


193 


Comrade, you might have noticed I was a little elewated 
in spirits when you come in to-night. I’ve found some- 
thing.” 

“What have you found?” asked Yenus, clutching him 
with both hands, so that they stood interlocked like a couple 
of preposterous gladiators. 

“ There’s no time to tell you now. I think he must have 
<fone to look for it. We must have an eye upon him in- 
stantly.” 

Releasing each other, they crept to the door, opened it 
softly, and peeped out. It was a cloudy night, and the black 
shadow of the Mounds made the dark yard darker. “ If not 
a double swindler,” whispered Wegg, “ why a dark lantern ? 
We could have seen what he was about, if he had carried a 
light one. Softly, this way.” 

Cautiously along the path that was bordered by frag- 
ments of crockery set in ashes, the two stole after him. “ He 
knows the place by heart,” muttered Silas, “ and don’t need 
to turn his lantern on, confound him! ” But he did turn it 
on, almost at the same instant, and flashed its light upon the 
first of the mounds. 

“ He’s warm,” said Silas. “ He’s precious warm. He’s 
close. I think he must be going to look for it.” 

He darkened his lantern again, and the mound turned 
black. After a few seconds, he turned the light on once 
more, and was seen standing at the foot of the second 
mound, slowly raising the lantern little by little until he held 
it up at arm’s length, as if he were examining the condition 
of the whole surface. 

“ He’s getting cold,” said Wegg. 

“ It strikes me,” whispered Yenus, “ that he wants to find 
out whether any one has been groping about there.” 

“ Hush 1 ” returned Wegg, “ he’s getting colder and cold- 
er. — How he’s freezing 1 ” 

He had turned the lantern off again, and on again, and was 
visible at the foot of the third mound. 

“ Why, he’s going up it 1 ” said Yenus. 

“ Shovel and all! ” said Wegg. 

At a nimbler trot, as if the shovel over his shoulder stimu- 
lated him by reviving old associations, Mr. Boffin ascended 
13 


194 


CONDENSED CLASSICS, 


the “ serpentining walk,” up the Mound. On striking into 
it he turned his lantern off. The two followed him, stoop- 
ing low, so that their figures might make no mark in relief 
against the sky when he should turn his lantern on again. 

Graining the top of the Mound, he turned on his light — but 
only partially — and stood it on the ground. He tucked up 
his cuffs and spat on his hands, and then went at it like an 
old digger as he was. Some dozen or so of expert strokes 
sufficed. Then he stopped, looked down into the cavity, 
bent over it, and took out what appeared to be an ordinary 
case-bottle. As soon as he had done this, he turned off his 
lantern, and they could hear that he was filling up the hole in 
the dark. The ashes being easily moved by a skillful hand, 
the spies took this as a hint to make off in good time. 

Mr. Boffin came down leisurely. 

“ What’s the matter, Wegg ? ” said he. You are as pale 
as a candle.” 

Mr. W egg replied that he felt as if he had had a turn. 

“ Bile,” said Mr. Boffin, blowing out the light in the lan- 
tern, shutting it up, and stowing it away in the breast of his 
coat as before. “ Physic yourself to-morrow, W egg, to be in 
order for next night. By-the-by, this neighborhood is go- 
ing to have a loss, Wegg.” 

‘‘ A loss, sir ? ” 

“ Groing to lose the Mounds.” 

“ Have you parted with them, Mr. Boffin ? ” asked Silas. 

“ Yes ; they’re going. Mine’s as good as gone already.” 

“ You mean the little one, with a pole atop, sir.” 

“ Yes,” said Mr. Boffin, rubbing his ear in his old way, with 
that new touch of craftiness added to it. “ It has fetched a 
penny. It’ll begin to be carted off to-morrow.” 

CHAPTER XXXIY. 

T he friendly movers sat panting and eyeing one another, 
after Mr. Boffin had slammed the gate and gone away. 
In the weak eyes of Yenus and in every reddish dust-colored 
hair in his shock of hair, there was a marked distrust of W egg 
and an alertness to fly at him on perceiving the smallest oc- 
casion. In the hard-grained face of Wegg, and in his stiff 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


195 


knotty figure, there was expressed a politic conciliation, 
which had no spontaneity in it. 

“ Comrade,” said Wegg, what a speaking countenance is 
yours ! Clearly do I know what question your expressive 
features put to me.” 

What question ? ” said V enus. 

The question,” returned Wegg, with a sort of joyful affa- 
bility, “ why I didn’t mention sooner, that I had found some- 
thing. Now, you can’t read in my face whafc answer I 
give ? ” 

“No, I can’t,” said Venus. 

“ I knew it ! And why not ? ” returned Wegg, with the 
same joyful candor. “ Because I lay no claims to a speaking 
countenance. But I can answer in words. And in what 
words ? These. I wanted to give you a delightful sap — 
pur — izE ! Your speaking countenance, being answered to 
its satisfaction, only asks then, ^ What have you found ? ’ 
Man and brother, partner in feelings equally with undertak- 
ings and actions, I have found a cash-box. A small flat ob- 
long cash-box. Shall I say it was disappointingly light ? ” 

“ There were papers in it,” said Venus. 

“ There your expressive countenance speaks indeed ! ” 
cried W egg. “ A paper. The box was locked, tied up, and 
sealed, and on it was a parchment label, with the writing, 

‘ MY WILL, JOHN HARMON, TEMPORARILY DEPOSITED HERE.’ ” 

“ We must know its contents,” said Venus. 

“ — Hear me out,” cried W^egg. “I said so, and I broke 
the box open.” 

“ Without coming to me ! ” exclaimed Venus. 

“ Exactly so, sir ! ” returned Wegg, blandly and buoyant- 
ly. “I seel take you with me! Hear, hear, hear! Re- 
solved, as your discriminating good sense perceives, that if 
you was to have a sap — pur — ize, it should be a complete 
one! W^ell, sir, and so you' have honored me by anticipat- 
ing, I examined the document. Regularly executed, regu- 
larly witnessed, very short. Inasmuch as he has never made 
friends, and has ever had a rebellious family, he, John Har- 
mon, gives to Nicodemus Boffin the Liitle Mound,which is 
quite enough for him, and gives the whole rest anffiresidue 
of his property to the Crown.” 


196 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ The date of the will that has been proved must be look- 
ed to,” remarked Yenus. “ It may be later than this one.” 

‘‘ — Hear me out! ” cried Wegg. said so. I paid a 
shilling (never mind your sixpence of it) to look up that will. 
Brother, that will is dated months before this will. And 
now, as a fellow-man, and as a partner in a friendly move,” 
added W egg, benignantly taking him by both hands again, 
and clapping him on both knees again, “ say, have I com- 
pleted my labor of love to your perfect satisfaction, and are 
you sap — pur — ized ? ” 

Mr. Yenus contemplated his fellow-man and partner 
with doubting eyes, and then rejoined stiffly : 

This is great news indeed, Mr. W egg. There’s no deny- 
ing it. But I could have wished you had told it me before 
you got your fright to-night, and I could have wished you 
had ever asked me as your partner what we were to do.” 

“ — Hear me out I ” cried W egg. “ I knew you was a-go- 
ing to say so. But alone I bore the anxiety, and alone I’ll 
bear the blame I ” 

“ Now,” said Yenus. “ Let’s see this will and this box.” 

‘‘ Do I understand, brother,” returned Wegg with consid- 
erable reluctance, “ that it is your wish to see this will and 
this — ? ” 

Mr. Yenus smote the table with his hand. 

“ Hear me out I ” said W egg. “ Hear me out 1 I’ll go and 
fetch ’em.” 

After being some time absent, as if in his covetousness he 
could hardly make up his mind to produce the treasure to his 
partner, he returned with an old leathern hat-box, into 
which he had put the other box, for the better preservation 
of commonplace appearances, and for the disarming of suspi- 
cion. But I don’t half like opening it here,” said Silas in a 
low voice, looking around : “he might come back, he may 
not be gone ; we don’t know what he may be up to, after 
what we’ve seen.” 

“ There’s something in that,” assented Y enus. “ Come to 
my place.” 

Not very well seeing his way to a refusal, Mr. Wegg tien 
rejoined in a gush, “Hear me out! — Certainly.” So he 
locked up the Bower and they set forth. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 197 

“Now, sir,” said Yenus, when they were safely in his 
shop, “ let us see this discovery.” 

Wegg reluctantly opened the hat-box and revealed the 
cash-box, opened the cash-box and revealed the will. He 
held a corner of it tight, while Y enus, taking hold of another 
corner, searchingly and attentively read it. 

“ Was I correct in my account of it, partner ? ” 

“ Partner, you were.” 

Mr. Wegg made an easy graceful movement, as though 
he would fold it up ; but Mr. Y enus held on by his corner. 

“No, sir,” said Mr. Yenus, winking his weak eyes and 
shaking his head. “No, partner. The question is now 
brought up, who is going to take care of this. Do you know 
who is going to take care of this, partner ? ” 

“ I am,” said Wegg. 

“ Oh dear no, partner,” retorted Yenus. “ That’s a mis- 
take. I am. Now look here, Mr. Wegg. I don’t want to 
have any words with you, and still less do I want to have 
any anatomical pursuits with you.” 

“ What do you mean ? ” said Wegg, quickly. 

“ I mean, partner,” replied Yenus, slowly, “ that it’s hard- 
ly possible for a man to feel in a more amiable state towards 
another man than I do towards you at this present moment. 
But I am on my own ground, I am surrounded by the tro- 
phies of my art, and my tools is very handy. There’s the 
Miscellanies of several human specimens (though you 
mightn’t think it) in the box on which you’re sitting. 
There’s the Miscellanies of several human specimens, in the 
lovely compo-one behind the door ; ” with a nod towards the 
F rench gentleman. “ It still wants a pair of arms. I don't 
say that I’m in any hurry for ’em.” 

“You must be wandering in your mind, partner,” Silas 
remonstrated. 

“ You’ll excuse me if I wander,” returned Yenus ; “ I am 
sometimes rather subject to it. I like my art, and I know 
how to exercise my art, and I mean to have the keeping of 
this document.” 

“ Partner,” said Y^egg, after a silence, “ don’t your speak- 
ing countenance say that you’re a-going to suggest a middle 
course ? ” 


198 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Yenus shook his shock of hair as he replied, ‘‘Partner, 
you have kept this paper from me once. You shall never 
keep it from me again. I offer you the box and the label to 
take care of, but I’ll take care of the paper.” 

Silas hesitated a little longer, and then suddenly releasing 
his corner, and resuming his buoyant and benignant tone, 
exclaimed, “ What’s life 'without trustfulness ! What’s a 
fellow-man without honor ! Y ou’re welcome to it, partner, 
in a spirit of trust and confidence.” 

Mr. Y enus folded the paper now left in his hand, and lock- 
ed it in a drawer behind him, and pocketed the key. 

“ ISText,” said he, “ conies the question. What’s the course 
to be pursued ? ” 

On this head, Silas W egg had much to say. The fortunes 
of his brother and comrade, and of himself, were evidently 
made, inasmuch as they had but to put their price upon this 
document, and get that price from the minion of fortune and 
the worm of the hour, who now appeared to be less of a min- 
ion and more of a worm than had been previously supposed. 
Wegg considered it plain that such a price was statable in a 
single expressive word, and that the word was “ Halves ! ” 
The plan of action was that they should lie by with patience ; 
that they should allow the Mounds to be gradually leveled 
and cleared away, while retaining to themselves their pres- 
ent opportunity of watching the process — which would be, 
he conceived, to put the trouble and cost of daily digging and 
delving upon somebody else, while they might nightly turn 
such complete disturbance of the dust to the account of their 
own private investigations — and that, when the Mounds 
were gone, and they had worked those chances for their own 
joint benefit solely, they should then, and not before, ex- 
plode on the minion and worm. 

“Brother,” said Wegg, when this happy understanding 
was established, “ I should like to ask you something. 
There you sit, sir, in the midst of your works, looking as if 
you’d been called upon for Home, Sweet Home, and was 
obleeging the company ! 

‘ A exile from home splendor dazzles in vain, 

* O give you your lowly preparations again, 

* The birds stuffed so sweetly that can’t be expected to come at your call 

‘ Give you these with the peace of mind dearer than all. 

‘ Home, Home, Home, sweet Home ! ’ 


OUE MUTUAL FRIEND. 


199 


— Be it ever,” added Mr. Wegg in prose as he glanced about 
the shop, ever so ghastly, all things considered there’s no 
place like it. How's it going on ? Is it looking up at all ? ” 

“ She does not wish, ” replied Mr. Venus, “ to regard her- 
self, nor yet to be regarded, in that particular light. There’s 
no more to be said.” 

‘‘You didn’t mention her name, sir, I think?” observed 
W egg, pensively. “No, you didn’t mention her name that 
night.” 

“ Pleasant Riderhood.” 

“ In — deed ! ” cried Wegg. “ Pleasant Riderhood. There’s 
something moving in the name. Pleasant. Dear me! 
Seems to express what she might have been, if she hadn’t 
made that unpleasant remark — and what she ain’t, in conse- 
quence of having made it. ” 

Seeming for the time to have lost his power of assuming 
an interest in the woes of Mr. V enus, Silas fell to tightening 
his wooden leg as a preparation for departure. 


CHAPTER XXXV. 



LD Betty Higden fared upon her pilgrimage' as many 


ruggedly honest creatures, women and men, fare on 
their toiling way along the roads of life. 

Nothing had been heard of her at Mrs. Boffin’s house since 
she trudged off. The weather had been hard and the roads 
had been bad, and her spirit was up. 

Faithful soul 1 When she had spoken to the Secretary of 
“ that deadness that steals over me at times,” her fortitude 
had made too little of it. Oftener and ever oftener, it came 
stealing over her ; darker and ever darker,, like the shadow of 
advancing Death. 

She was traveling along by a part of the road where it 
touched the river, and in wet seasons was so often over- 
flowed by it that there were tall white posts set up to mark 
the way. A barge was being towed towards her, and she 
sat down on the bank to rest and watch it. As the tow-rope 
was slackened by a turn of the stream and dipped into the 
water, such a confusion stole into her mind that she thought 
she saw the forms of her dead chiLdi’cn arwl de-ad grandchil- 


200 


CONDENSED CLASSICS, 


dren peopling the barge, and waving their hands to her in 
solemn measure ; then, as the rope tightened and came up, 
dropping diamonds, it seemed to vibrate into two parallel 
ropes and strike her, with a twang, though it was far off. 
When she looked again, there was no barge, no river, no 
daylight, and a man held a candle close to her face. 

“ Now, Missis,” said he ; “ where did you come from and 
where are you going to ? ” 

The poor soul confusedly asked where she was. 

“ I am the Lock,” said the man. 

“The Lock?” 

“ I am the Deputy Lock, on job, and this is the Lock- 
house. (Lock or Deputy Lock, it’s all one, while the t’other 
man’s in the hospital.) What’s your Parish ? ” 

“Parish! ” She was up from the truckle-bed directly, 
wildly feeling about her for her basket ; and gazing at him in 
affright. 

“ You’ll be asked the question down town,” said the man. 
“ They won’t let you be more than a Casual there. They’ll 
pass you on to your settlement, Missis, with all speed. 
You’re not in a state to be let come upon strange parishes 
’ceptin’ as a Casual.” 

“ ’Twas the deadness again 1 ” murmured Betty Higden. 

“ It was the deadness, there’s not a doubt about it,” re- 
turned the man. “ I should have thought the deadness was 
a mild word for it, if it had been named to me when we 
brought you in. Have you got any friends. Missis ? ” 

“ The best of friends. Master.” 

“ I should recommend your looking ’em up if you consider 
’em game to do anything for you,” said the Deputy Lock. 
“ Have you got any money ? ” 

“ Just a morsel of money, sir.’' 

“ Do you want to keep it ? ” 

“Sureldo!” 

“ Well, you know,” said the Deputy Lock, shrugging his 
shoulders with his hands in his pockets, and shaking his head 
in a sulkily ominous manner, “ the parish authorities down 
town will have it out of you, if you go on, you may take ur 
Alfred David.” 

“ Then I’ll not go on.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


201 


“ They’ll make you pay, as fur as your money will go,” 
pursued the Deputy, “ for your relief as a Casual and for 
your being passed to your Parish.” 

Thank ye kindly. Master, for your warning, thank ye for 
your shelter, and good-night.” 

Stop a bit,” said the Deputy, striking in between her and 
the door. “ Why are you all of a shake, and what’s your 
hurry. Missis ? ” 

“Oh, Master, Master,” returned Betty Higden, “I’ve 
fought against the Parish and fled from it all my life, and I 
want to die free of it.” 

“ I don’t know,” said the Deputy, wuth deliberation, “ as I 
ought to let you go. I’m a honest man as gets my living by 
the sweat of my brow, and I may fall into trouble by letting 
you go. I’ve fell into trouble afore now, by Oeorge, and I 
know what it is, and it’s made me careful. You might be 
took with your deadness again, half a mile oft^^ — or half of 
hah a quarter, for the matter of that — and then it would be 
asked. Why did that there honest Deputy Lock let her go, 
instead of putting her safe with the Parish ? What amount 
of small change. Missis,” he said, with an abstracted air, after 
a little meditation, “ might you call a morsel of money ? ” 

Hurriedly emptying her pocket, old Betty laid down on 
the table, a shilling, and two sixpenny pieces, and a few 
pence. 

“ If I was to let you go instead of handing you over safe to 
the Parish,” said the Deputy, “might it be your own free 
wish to leave that there behind you ? ” 

“ Take it, Master, take it, and welcome and thankful ! ” 

“ I’m a man,” said the Deputy, pocketing the coins, one by 
one, “ as earns his living by the sweat of his brow; and I 
won’t stand in your way. GrO where you like.” 

She was gone out of the Lock-house, as soon as he gave 
her this permission, and her tottering steps were on the road 
again. But she struck off by side ways, among which she 
got bewildered and lost. 

The morning found her afoot again, but fast declining as 
to the clearness of her thoughts, though not as to the steadi- 
ness of her purpose. 

Sewn in the breast of her gown, the money to pay for her 


202 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


burial was still intact. If she could wear through the day, 
and then lie down to die under cover of the darkness, she 
would die independent. 

So, keeping to by-ways, and shunning human approach, 
this troublesome old woman hid herself, and fared on all 
through the dreary day. Yet so unlike was she to vagrant 
hiders in general, that sometimes as the day advanced, there 
was a bright fire in her eyes, and a quicker beating at her fee- 
ble heart, as though she said exultingly, “ The Lord will see 
me through it ! ” 

“ Water-meadows, or such like,” she had sometimes mur- 
mured, on the day’s pilgrimage, when she had raised her 
head and taken any note of the real objects about her. There 
now arose in the darkness, a great building, full of lighted 
windows. Smoke was issuing from a high chimney in the 
rear of it, and there was the sound of a water-wheel at the 
side. Between her and the building lay a piece of water, in 
which the lighted windows were reflected, and on its near- 
est margin was a plantation of trees. I humbly thank the 
Power and the Grlory,” said Betty Higden, holding up her 
withered hands, “ that I have come to my journey’s end ! ” 

She crept among the trees to the trunk of a tree whence 
she could see, beyond some intervening trees and branches, 
the lighted windows, both in their reality and their reflection 
in the water. She placed her orderly little basket at her 
side, and sank upon the ground, supporting herself against 
the tree. It brought to her mind the foot of the Cross, and 
she committed herself to Him who died upon it. Her 
strength held out to enable her to arrange the letter in her 
breast, so that it could be seen that she had a paper there. It 
had held out for this, and it departed when this was done. 

“ I am safe here,” was her last benumbed thought. 
“ When I aih found dead at the foot of the Cross, it will be 
by some of my own sort ; some of the working people who 
work among the lights yonder. I cannot see the lighted 
windows now, but they are there. I am thankful for all.” 

* * * * 

The darkness gone, and a face bending down. 

‘‘ It cannot be the boofer lady ? ” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


203 


“ I don’t understand what you say. Let me wet your lips 
again with this brandy. I have been away to fetch it.” 

It is as the face of a woman, shaded by a quantity of rich 
dark hair. It is the earnest face of a woman who is young 
and handsome. But all is over with me on earth, and this 
must be an Angel. 

Have I been long dead ? ” 

I don’t understand what you say. Let me wet your lips 
again. I hurried all I could, and brought no one back with 
me, lest you should die of the shock of strangers.” 

“Am I not dead?” 

“I cannot understand what you say. Your voice is so 
low and broken that I cannot hear you. Do you hear me ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Do you mean Yes ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“I was coming from my work just now, along the path 
outside (I was up with the night hands last night), and I 
heard a groan, and found you lying here.” 

“ What work, deary ? ” 

“ Did you ask what work ? At the paper-mill.” 

“Where is it? ” 

“ Your face is turned up to the sky, and you can’t see it. 
It is close by. You can see my face, here, between you and 
the sky ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Dare I lift you? ” 

“Not yet.” 

“ N ot even lift your head to get it on my arm ? I will do 
it by very gentle degrees. Y ou shall hardly feel it.” 

“Not yet. Paper. Letter.” 

“ This paper in your breast ? ” ^ 

“ Bless ye ! ” 

“Let me wet your lips again. Am I to open it? To read 
it?” 

“ Bless ye ! ” 

She reads it with surprise, and looks down with a new ex- 
pression and an added interest on the motionless face she 
kneels beside. 

“ I know these names. I have heard them often.” 


204 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Will you send it, my dear ? ” 

“ I cannot understand you. Let me wet your lips again, 
and your forehead. There. 0 poor thing, poor thing ! ” 
These words through her fast dropping tears. “ What was 
it that you asked me ? W ait till I bring my ear quite close.” 

“Will you send it, my dear ? ” 

“ Will I send it to the writers ? Yes, certainly.” 

“ You will not give it up to any one but them ? ” 

“No.” 

“ As you must grow old in time, and come to your dying 
hour, my dear, you’ll not give it up to any one but them ? ” 

“ No . Most solemnly. ’ ’ 

“ Never to the Parish ! ” with a convulsed struggle. 

“ No. Most solemnly.” 

“ Nor let the Parish touch me, nor yet so much as look at 
me ! ” with another struggle. 

“No. Faithfully.” 

A look of thankfulness and triumph lighted the worn old 
face. The eyes which have been darkly jfixed upon the sky, 
turn with meaning in them towards the compassionate face 
from which the tears are dropping, and a smile is on the aged 
lips as they ask : 

“ What is your name, my dear ? ” 

“ My name is Lizzie Hexam.” 

“ I must be sore disfigured. Are you afraid to kiss me ? ” 

The answer is, the ready pressure of her lips upon the cold 
but smiling mouth. 

“ Bless ye ! Now lift me, my love.” 

Lizzie Hexam very softly raised the weather-stained gray 
head, and lifted her as high as Heaven. 

CHAPTER XXXYI. 

46 4 TTTE GIVE THEE HEARTY THANKS FOR THAT IT HATH 
T T PLEASED THEE TO DELIVER THIS OUR SISTER OUT OF 
THE MISERIES OF THIS SINFUL WORLD.’ ” So read the Rever- 
end Frank Milvey, above the ashes of Betty Higden, in a 
corner of a church-yard near the river. 

Near unto the Reverend Frank Milvey as he read, stood 
his little wife, John Rokesmith the Secretary, and Bella 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


205 


Wilfer. These, over and above Sloppy, were the mourners 
at the lowly grave. Not a penny had been added to the 
money sewn in her dress ; what her honest spirit had so long 
projected, was fulfilled. 

“ I’ve took it in my head,” said Sloppy, laying it, inconsol- 
able, against the church door, when all was done : I’ve took^-^ 
it in my wretched head that I might have sometimes turned 
a little harder for her, and it cuts me deep to think so 
now.” 

The Reverend Frank Milvey, comforting Sloppy, ex- 
pounded to him how the best of us were more or less remiss 
in our turnings at our respective Mangles — some of us very 
much so — and how we were all a halting, failing, feeble, and 
inconstant crew. 

/S'/ie warn’t, sir,” said Sloppy, taking this ghostly counsel 
rather ill, in behalf of his late benefactress. “ Let us speak 
for ourselves, sir. She went through with whatever duty 
she had to do. She went through with me, she went 
through with the Minders, she went through with herself, 
she went through with everythink. 0 Mrs. Higden, Mrs. 
Higden, you was a woman and a mother and a mangier in a 
million million ! ” 

They passed out at the wicket-gate. The water-wheel of 
the paper-mill was audible there, and seemed to have a soft- 
ening influence on the bright wintry scene. They had ar- 
rived but a little while before, and Lizzie Hexam now told 
them the little she could add to the letter in which she had 
enclosed Mr. Rokesmith’s letter and had asked for their in- 
structions. 

Bella and the Secretary observed Lizzie Hexam with 
great attention. Brought face to face for the first time with 
the daughter of his supposed murderer, it was natural that 
John Harmon should have his own secret reasons for a care- 
ful scrutiny of her countenance and manner. Bella knew 
that Lizzie’s father had beeii falsely accused of the crime 
which had had so great an influence on her own life and for- 
tunes ; and her interest was equally natural. Both had ex- 
pected to see something very different from the real Lizzie 
Hexam, and thus it fell out that she became the unconscious^ 
means of bringing them together. 


206 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


For when they had walked on with her to the little house 
in the clean village by the paper-mill, where Lizzie had a 
lodging with an elderly couple employed in the establish- 
ment, and when Mrs. Milvey and Bella had been up to see 
her room and had come down, the mill bell rang. This 
called Lizzie away for the time, and left the Secretary and 
Bella standing rather awkwardly in the small street. 

After a little stiff conversation, in which she was conscious 
of making all the advances, Bella exclaimed : 

Oh, Mr. Eokesmith, don’t be hard with me, don’t be 
stern with me ; be magnanimous ! I want to talk with you 
on equal terms.” 

“ Upon my honor I had no thought but for you,” returned 
the Secretary, suddenly brightening, “ I forced myself to be 
constrained, lest you might misinterpret my being more nat- 
ural.” 

‘‘ Thank you,” said Bella, holding out her little hand. 
“ Forgive me.” 

‘‘ No ! ” cried the Secretary, eagerly. “ Forgive me / You 
remember, of course, that in Lizzie’s short letter to Mrs. Bof- 
fin, she stipulated that either her name, or else her place of 
residence, must be kept strictly a secret among us. It is my 
duty to find out why she made that stipulation. If you 
would speak with her alone before we go away from here, I 
feel quite sure that a natural and easy confidence would arise 
between you. If you do not object to put this question to 
her — to ascertain for us her own feeling in this one matter — 
you can do so at a far greater advantage than I or any one 
else could. Mr. Boffin is anxious on the subject. And I 
am,” added the Secretary after a moment, “ for a special rea- 
son, very anxious.” 

“ I shall be happy„ Mr. Eokesmith,” returned Bella, “ to 
be of the least use ; for I feel, after the serious scene of to- 
day, that I am useless enough in this world.” 

Don’t say that,” urged the Secretary. “ I don’t like to 
hear you depreciate yourself.” 

Mr. Eokesmith, it seems so long since we spoke togeth- 
er naturally, that I am embarrassed in approaching another 
subj ect. Mr. Boffin. Y ou know I am very grateful to him ; 
don’ t y ou ? You know I feel a true respect for him, and am 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


207 


bound to him by the strong ties of his own generosity ; now 
don’t you?” 

^‘Unquestionably. And also tfiat you are his favorite 
companion.” 

“ That makes it,” said Bella, “ so very difficult to speak of 
him. But — Does he treat you well ? ” 

“ You see how he treats me,” the Secretary answered, 
with a patient and yet proud air. 

“ Yes, and I see it with pain,” said Bella, energetically. 

The Secretary gave her a radiant look. 

“ I see it with pain,” repeated Bella, “ and it often makes 
me miserable, because I cannot bear to be forced to admit to 
myself that Fortune is spoiling Mr. Boffin.” 

“Miss Wilfer,” said the Secretary, with a beaming face, 
“ if you could know with what delight I make the discovery 
that Fortune is not spoiling yott, you would know that it 
more than compensates me for any slight at any other 
hands.” 

“ Oh, don’t speak of me. You don’t know" me as well as — ” 

“ As you know yourself ? ” suggested the Secretary, find- 
ing that she stopped. “ Do you know yourself ? ” 

“ I know quite enough of myself, and I don’t improve up- 
on acquaintance. But Mr. Boffin.” 

“ That Mr. Boffin’s manner to me, or consideration for me, 
is not what it used to be, must be admitted.” 

“ It must try you very much, and — you must please prom- 
ise me that you won’t take ill wffiat I am going to add, Mr. 
Rokesmith? ” 

“ I promise it with all my heart.” 

“ — And it must sometimes, I should think, a little lower 
you in your own estimation ? ” 

“ I have very strong reasons, Mip Wilfer, for bearing 
with the drawbacks of my position in the house we both in- 
habit. Believe that they are not all mercenary, although I 
have, through a series of strange fatalities, faded out of my 
place in life.” 

“ I think I have noticed,” said Bella, looking at him with 
curiosity, as not quite making him out, “ that you repress 
yourself, and force yourself to act a passive part.” 

“You are right. I repress myself and force myself to acl 
a part. I have a settled purpose.” 


208 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ And a good one, I hope,” said Bella. 

“ And a good one, I hope,” he answered. 

“ Sometimes I have fancied, sir, that your great regard for 
Mrs. Boffin is a very powerful motive with you.” 

“ Y ou are right again ; it is. I would do anything for her, 
bear anything for her. There are no words to express how 
I esteem that good, good woman.” 

“ As I do too ! May I ask you one thing more ? ” 

“ Anything more.” 

“ Of course you see that she really suffers, when Mr. Bof- 
fin shows how he is changing ? ” 

“ I see it, every day, and am grieved to give her pain.” 

“ To give her pain ? ” said Bella, repeating the phrase 
quickly, with her eyebrows raised. 

“ I am generally the unfortunate cause of it.” 

‘‘ Perhaps she says to you, as she often says to me, that he 
is the best of men, in spite of all.” 

‘‘ I often overhear her, in her honest and beautiful devo- 
tion to him, saying so to you,” returned the Secretary, “ but 
I cannot assert that she ever says so to me.” 

Bella met his steady look for a moment with a wistful, 
musing little look of her own, and then heaved a httle sigh, 
and gave up things in general for a bad job. 

So they got back to the village as Lizzie Hexam was com- 
ing from the paper-mill, and Bella detached herself to speak 
with her in her own home. 

She set forth that request of Lizzie’s touching secrecy, and 
delicately spoke of that false accusation and its retractation, 
and asked might she beg to be informed whether it had any 
bearing, near or remote, on such request. 

“Has the accusation anything to do with my wishing to 
live quite secret and retire d here ? Ho. ” 

As Lizzie Hexam shook her head in giving this reply and 
as her glance sought the fire, there was a quiet resolution in 
her folded hands, not lost on Bella’s bright eyes. 

“ Have you lived much alone ? ” asked Bella. 

“Yes. It’s nothing new to me. I used to be always 
alone many hours together, in the day and in the night, 
when poor father was alive.” 

“ Tell me, my dear,” said Bella, “ what is the matter, and 
why you live like this.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


209 


Lizzie presently began, by way of prelude, “You must 
have many lovers — ” when Bella checked her with a little 
scream of astonishment. 

“ My dear, I haven’t one ! ” 

“Not one?” 

“Well ! Perhaps one,” said Bella. “ I am sure I don’t 
know. I had one, but what he may think about it at the 
present time I can’t say. Perhaps I have half a one (of 
course I don’t count that Idiot, Greorge Sampson). How^- 
ever, never mind me. I want to hear about you.” 

“ There is a certain man,” said Lizzie, “ a passionate and 
angry man, who says he loves me, and who I must believe 
does love me. He is the friend of my brother. I shrank 
from him within myself when my brother first brought him 
to me ; but the last time I saw him he terrified me more than 
I can say.” There she stopped. 

“ Did you come here to escape from him, Lizzie ? ” 

“ I came here immediately after he so alarmed me.” 

“ Are you afraid of him here ? ” 

“ I am not timid generally, but I am always afraid of him. 
I am afraid to see a newspaper, or to hear a word spoken of 
what is done in London, lest he should have done some vio- 
lence.” 

“ Then you are not afraid of him for yourself, dear ? ” 

“ I should be even that, if I met him about here. I look 
round for him always, as I pass to and fro at night.” 

“ Are you afraid of anything he may do to himself in Lon- 
don, my dear ? ” 

“No. He might be fierce enough even to do some vio- 
lence to himself, but I don’t think of that.” 

“ Then it would almost seem, dear,” said Bella, quaintly, 
“ as if there must be somebody else.” 

Lizzie put her hands before her face for a moment before 
replying : “ The words are always in my ears, and the blow 
he struck upon a stone wall as he said them is always before 
my eyes. I have tried hard to think it not worth remember- 
ing, but I cannot make so little of it. His hand was trick- 
ling down with blood as he said to me, ‘ Then I hope that I 
may never kill him ! ’ ” 

Bather startled, Bella made and clasped a girdle of hei 

14 


210 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


arms round Lizzie’s waist, and then asked quietly, in a soft 
voice, as they both looked at the fire : 

“ Kill him ! Is this man so jealous, then ? ” 

Of a gentleman,” said Lizzie. “ — I hardly know how to 
tell you — of a gentleman far above me and my way of life, 
who broke father’s death to me, and has shown an interest in 
me since.” 

“ Does he love you ? ” 

Lizzie shook her head. 

Does he admire you ? ” 

Lizzie ceased to shake her head, and pressed her hand 
upon her living girdle. 

“ Is it through his influence that you came here ? ” 

“ 0 no ! And of all the world I wouldn’t have him know 
that I am here, or get the least clue where to find me.” 

“ Lizzie, dear ! Why ? ” asked Bella, in amazement at this 
burst. But then quickly added, reading Lizzie’s face : ‘‘No. 
Don’t say why. That was a foohsh question of mine. I 
see, I see.” 

There was silence between them. Lizzie, with a droop- 
ing head, glanced down at the glow in the fire. 

“ You know all now,” she said, raising her eyes to Bella’s. 
“ There is nothing left out. I have a kind of picture of him 
— or of what he might have been, if I had been a lady, and he 
loved me — which is always with me, and which I somehow 
feel that I could not do a mean or a wrong thing before. I 
prize the remembrance that he has done me nothing but 
good since I have known him, and that he has made a change 
within me, like — like the change in the grain of these hands, 
which were coarse, and cracked, and hard, and brown when 
I rowed on the river with father, and are softened and made 
supple by this new work as you see them now.” 

They trembled, but with no weakness, as she shoTved 
them. 

“ Understand me, my dear ; ” thus she went on. “ I have 
never dreamed of the possibility of his being anything to me 
on this earth but the kind of picture that I know I could not 
make you understand, if the understanding was not in your 
own breast already. I have no more dreamed of the possi- 
bility of my being his wife, than he ever has — an 1 words 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


211 


could not be stronger than that. And yet I love him. 1 
love him so much, and so dearly, that when I sometimes 
think my life may be but a weary one, I am proud of it and 
glad of it. I am proud and glad to suffer something for him, 
even though it is of no service to him, and he will never 
know of it or care for it.” 

Bella sat enchained by the deep, unselfish passion of this 
girl or woman of her own age, courageously revealing itself 
in the confidence of her sympathetic perception of its truth. 
And yet she had never experienced anything like it, or 
thought of the existence of anything like it. 

The interview terminated with pleasant ’words on both 
sides, and with many reminders on the part of Bella that 
they were friends, and pledges that she would soon come 
dow n into that part of the country again. Therewith Lizzie 
returned to the mill, and Bella ran over to the little inn. 

You look rather serious,” said the Secretary. 

I feel rather serious,” returned Miss Wilfer. 

She had nothing else to tell but that Lizzie Hexam’s secret 
had no reference whatever to the cruel charge, or its with- 
drawal. Oh yes though ! said Bella ; she might as well men- 
tion one other thing ; Lizzie was very desirous to thank her 
unknown friend who had sent her the written retractation. 
W as she indeed ? observed the Secretary. Ah ! Bella asked 
him, had he any notion who that unknown friend might be ? 
He had no notion whatever. 

They were to return by the train presently, and, the sta- 
tion being near at hand, the Reverend Frank and Mrs, 
Frank, and Sloppy, and Bella, and the Secretary, set out to 
walk to it. Few rustic paths are wide enough for five, and 
Bella and the Secretary dropped behind. 

“Can you believe, Mr. Rokesmith,” said Bella, “that I 
feel as if whole years had passed since I went into Lizzie 
Hexam’s cottage ? ” 

“We have crowded a good deal into the day,” he returned, 
“ and you were much affected in the church-yard. Y ou are 
over- tired.” 

“ Ho, I am not at all tired. I don’t mean that I feel as if a 
great space of time had gone by, but that I feel as if much 
had happened — to myself, you know.” 


212 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ For good, I hope ? ” 

I hope so,” said Bella. 

“ You are cold ; I felt you tremble. Pray let me put this 
wrapper of mine about you. Now, it will be too heavy and 
too long. Let me carry this end over my arm, as you have 
no arm to give me.” 

Yes she had though. How she got it out, in her muffled 
state, Heaven knows ; but she got it out somehow — there it 
was — and slipped it through the Secretary’s. 

CHAPTER XXXYII. 

64 A ND SO, Miss Wren,” said Mr. Eugene Wrayburn, 
jl\. I cannot persuade you to dress me a doll ? ” 

“ No,” replied Miss Wren, snappishly ; “ if you want one, 
go and buy one at the shop.” 

“ And my charming young goddaughter,” said Mr. Wray- 
burn, plaintively, ‘‘ down in Hertfordshire — ” 

(“ Humbugshire you mean, I think,” interposed Miss 
Wren.) 

“ — is to be put upon the cold footing of the general public, 
and is to derive no advantage from my private acquaintance 
with the Court Dressmaker ? ” 

“ If it’s any advantage to your charming godchild — and 
oh, a precious godfather she has got ! ” — replied Miss Wren, 
pricking at him in the air with her needle, “to be informed 
that the Court Dressmaker knows your tricks and your man- 
ners, you may tell her so by post, with my compliments.” 

Miss Wren was busy at her work by candle-light, and Mr. 
Wrayburn, half amused and half vexed, and all idle and 
shiftless, stood by her bench looking on. Miss Wren’s troub- 
lesome child was in the corner in deep disgrace. 

“Ugh, you disgraceful boy ! ” exclaimed Miss Wren, at- 
tracted by the sound of his chattering teeth, “ I wish they’d 
all drop down your throat and play at dice in your stomach I 
Boh, wicked child ! Bee-baa, black sheep I ” 

The wretched creature protested with a whine. 

“ Don’t cry like that, or I’ll throw a doll at you. Pay five 
shillings fine for you indeed ! Fine in more ways than one, 
I think ! I’d give the dustman five shillings, to carry you off 
in the dust cart.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND, 


213 


“ JSTo, no,” pleaded the absurd creature. Please ! ” 

“ He’s enough to break his mother’s heart, is this boy,” 
said Miss Wren, half appealing to Eugene. “ I wish I had 
never brought him up. He’d be sharper than a serpent’s 
tooth, if he wasn’t as dull as ditch water. Look at him. 
There’s a pretty object for a parent’s eyes! There, I can’t 
bear to look at you. Go up-stairs and get me my bonnet 
and shawl. Make yourself useful in some way, bad boy, 
and let me have your room instead of your company, for one 
half minute.” 

He shambled out, and Eugene Wray burn saw the tears 
exude from between the little creature’s fingers as she kept 
her hand before her eyes. 

“I’m going to the Italian Opera to try on,” said Miss 
Wren, taking away her hand after a little while, and laugh- 
ing satirically to hide that she had been crying ; “ I must see 
your back before I go, Mr. W ray burn. Let me first tell you, 
once for all, that it’s of no use your paying visits to me. Y ou 
wouldn’t get what you want of me, no, not if you brought 
pincers with you to tear it out.” 

“ Are you so obstinate on the subject of a doll’s dress for 
my godchild ? ” 

“ Ah I ” returned Miss Wren with a hitch of her chin, “ I 
am so obstinate. And of course it’s on the subject of a doll’s 
dress — or acZdress — whichever you like. Get along and give 
it up.” 

Her degraded charge had come back, and was standing 
behind her with the bonnet and shawl. 

“Give ’em to me and get back into your corner, you 
naughty old thing I ” said Miss Wren, as she espied him. 

Eugene, with a lazy compliment or so to Miss Wren, 
begged leave to light his cigar and departed. He was loung- 
ing along moodily, when a most unexpected object caught 
his eyes. No less an object than J enny Wren’s bad boy try- 
ing to make up his mind to cross the road. 

“ It strikes me,” remarked Eugene coolly, after watching 
him for some minutes, “ that my friend is likely to be rather 
behind time if he has any appointment on hand.” 

Lightwood was at home when he got to the Chambers, and 
had dined alone there. Eugene drew a chair to the fire by 


214 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


which he was having his wine and reading the evening pa- 
per, and filled a glass for good fellowship’s sake. 

“ My dear Mortimer, you are the express picture of con- 
tented industry, reposing (on credit) after the virtuous la- 
bors of the day.” 

“ My dear Eugene, you are the express picture of discon- 
tented idleness not reposing at all. Where have you been ? ” 

“I have been,” replied Wrayburn; “ — about town. I 
have turned up at the present juncture, with the intention of 
consulting my highly intelligent and respected solicitor on 
the position of my affairs.” 

“ You have fallen into the hands of the Jews, Eugene.” 

“ My dear boy, having previously fallen into the hands of 
some of the Christians, I can bear it with philosophy.” 

“I have had an interview to-day, Eugene, with a Jew, 
who seems determined to press us hard. Quite a Shy lock, 
and quite a Patriarch. A picturesque gray -headed and 
gray -bearded old Jew, in a shovel-hat and gaberdine.” 

“ ISTot,” said Eugene, pausing and setting down his glass, 
“ surely not my worthy friend Mr. Aaron ? ” 

‘‘ He calls himself Mr. Riah.” 

“ Did he mention that he knew me ? ” 

He did not. He only said of you that he expected to be 
paid by you.” 

‘‘Which looks,” remarked Eugene with much gravity, 
“ like not knowing me. I hope it may not be my worthy 
friend Mr. Aaron, for, to tell you the truth, Mortimer, I 
doubt he may have a prepossession against me. I strongly 
suspect him of having had a hand in spiriting away Lizzie.” 

“ Everything,” returned Lightwood, impatiently, “ seems, 
by a fatality, to bring us round to Lizzie. ‘ About town ’ 
meant about Lizzie, just now, Eugene.” 

“ My solicitor, do you knoAV,” observed Eugene, turning 
round to the furniture, “ is a man of infinite discernment ! ” 

“ Did it not, Eugene ? ” 

“ Yes it did, Mortimer.” 

“ And yet you know you do not really care for her.” 

Eugene Wrayburn rose, and put his hands in his pockets, 
and stood with a foot on the fender, indolently rocking his 
body and looking at the fire. After a prolonged pause, he 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


215 


replied: “I don’t know that. I must ask you not to say 
that, as if we took it for granted.” 

“ But if you do care for her, so much the more should you 
leave her to herself. ’ ’ 

Having again paused as before, Eugene said: “I don't 
know that, either. But tell me. Did you ever see me take 
so much trouble about anything, as about this disappearance 
others? I ask, for information.” 

“ My dear Eugene, I wish I ever had ! ” 

“ Then you have not? Just so. You confirm my own 
impression. Does that look as if I cared for her ? I ask, for 
information.” 

“ I asked you for information, Eugene.” 

Dear boy, I know it, but I can’t give it.” 

Lightwood was shaking his head when a shuffling was 
heard at the outer door, and then an undecided knock, as 
though some hand were groping for the knocker. The 
frolicsome ^muth of the neighborhood,” said Eugene, 
“whom I should be delighted to pitch from this elevation in- 
to the church-yard below, without any intermediate cere- 
monies, have probably turned the lamp out. I am on duty 
to-night, and will see to the door.” 

His friend had barely had time to recall the unprecedent- 
ed gleam of determination with which he had spoken of 
finding this girl, and which had faded out of him with the 
breath of the spoken words, when Eugene came back, ush- 
ering in a most disgraceful shadow of a man, shaking from 
head to foot, and clothed in shabby grease and smear. 

“ This interesting gentleman,” said Eugene, “ is the son — 
the occasionally rather trying son, for he has his failings — 
of a lady of my acquaintance. My dear Mortimer — Mr. 
Dolls.” Eugene had no idea what his name was, knowing 
the little dressmaker’s to be assumed, but presented him 
under the first appellation that his associations suggested. 

“I gather, my dear Mortimer,” pursued Eugene, as 
Lightwood stared at the obscene visitor, “from the manner 
of Mr. Dolls — which is occasionally complicated — that he 
desires to make some communication to me. I have men- 
tioned to Mr. Dolls that you and I are on terms of confi- 
dence, and requested him to develop his views here.” 


216 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


The wretched object being much embarrassed by holding 
what remained of his hat, Eugene airily tossed it to the door, 
and put him down in a chair. 

It will be necessary, I think,” he observed, “ to wind up 
Mr. Dolls, before anything to any mortal purpose can be got 
out of him. Brandy, Mr. Dolls, or — ? ” 

Threepenn’orth Rum,” said Mr. Dolls. 

A judiciously small quantity of the spirit was given him. 

“ The nerves of Mr. Dolls,” remarked Eugene, are con- 
siderably unstrung. And I deem it on the whole expedient 
to fumigate Mr. Dolls.” 

He took the shovel from the grate, sprinkled a few live 
ashes on it, and from a box on the chimneypiece took a few 
pastiles, which he set upon them; then, with great com- 
posure, began placidly waving the shovel in front of Mr. 
Dolls, to cut him off from his company. 

How then. Speak out. Don’t be afraid. State your 
business, Dolls.” 

“ Mist Wrayburn ! ” said the visitor, thickly and huskily, 
‘‘you want that drection. You want t’know where she 
lives. Do you, Mist Wrayburn ? ” 

With a glance at his friend, Eugene replied, “ I do.” 

“ I am er man,” said Mr. Dolls, trying to smite himself on 
the breast, but bringing his hand to bear upon the vicinity of 
his eye, “ er do it. I am er man er do it.” 

“ What are you the man to do ? ” demanded Eugene. 

“ Er give up that drection.” 

“ Can you get the direction ? Do you mean that ? Speak! 
If that’s what you have come for, say how much you want.” 

“ Ten shillings — Threepenn’orths Rum,” said Mr. Dolls. 

“You shall have it.” 

“ Fifteen shillings — Threepenn’orths Rum,” said Mr. 
Dolls, making an attempt to stiffen himself. 

“You shall have it. Stop at that. How will you get the 
drection you talk of ? ” 

“ I am er man,” said Mr. Dolls, “ er get it, sir.” 

“ How will you get it, I ask you ? ” 

“ I am ill-used vidual,” said Mr. Dolls. “ Blown up morn- 
ing t’night. Called names. She makes Mint money, sir, 
and never stands Threepenn’orth Rum. She looks upon me 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


217 


as a mere child, sir. I am not mere child, sir. Man. Man 
talent. Lerrers pass betwixt ’em. Postman lerrers. Easy 
for man talent er get drection, as get his own drection.” 

Gret it then,” said Eugene; adding very heartily under 
his breath, “ — You Brute ! — Get it, and bring it here to me, 
and earn the money for sixty threepenn’orth’s of rum, and 
drink them all, one a-top of another, and drink yourself dead 
with all possible expedition.” 

Eugene picked up his worn out hat with the tongs, 
clapped it on his head, and, taking him by the collar — all this 
at arm’s length — conducted him down-stairs and out of the 
precincts into Fleet Street. There he turned his face west- 
ward, and left him. 

When he got back Lightwood was standing over the fire. 

“ I’ll wash my hands of Mr. Dolls — physically — ” said Eu- 
gene, and be with you again directly, Mortimer.” 

“ I would much prefer,” retorted Mortimer, “ your wash- 
ing your hands of Mr. Dolls, morally, Eugene.” . 

“So would I,” said Eugene, “but you see, dear boy, I 
can’t do without him. I am a little ashamed of it myseK, 
and therefore let us change the subject.” 

“ It is so deplorably underhanded, it is so unworthy of 
you, this setting on of such a shameful scout.” 

“We have changed the subject ! ” exclaimed Eugene, air- 
ily. “We have found a new one in that word, scout. 
Don’t be like Patience on a mantel-piece frowning at Dolls, 
but sit down, and I’ll tell you something that you really will 
find amusing. Take a cigar. Look at this of mine! I 
light it — draw one puff — breathe the smoke out — there it 
goes — it’s Dolls 1 — it’s gone — and being gone you are a man 
again.” 

“ Your subject,” said Mortimer, after lighting a cigar, 
“ was scouts, Eugene.” 

“ Exactly. Isn’t it droll that I never go out after dark, 
but I find myself attended, always by one scout, and often 
by two ? ” 

Lightwood looked at his friend, as if with a latent sus- 
picion that there must be a jest or hidden meaning in his 
words. 

“ On my honor, no,” said Wray burn, answering the look 


218 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


and smiling carelessly ; I don’t wonder at your supposing 
so, but on my honor, no. I say what I mean. I never go 
out after dark, but I find myself in the ludicrous situation of 
being followed and observed at a distance, always by one 
scout, and often by two.” 

Are you sure, Eugene ? ” 

“ Sure ? My dear boy, they are always the same.” 

“ But there’s no process out against you. The Jews only 
threaten. They have done nothing. Besides, they know 
where to find you, and I represent you. Why take the 
trouble ? ” 

‘‘Observe the legal mind! ” remarked Eugene, turning 
round to the furniture again, with an air of indolent rapture. 
“ Respected solicitor, it’s not that. The schoolmaster’s 
abroad.” 

“ The schoolmaster ? ” 

“Ay! Sometimes the schoolmaster and the pupil are 
both abroad. Why, how soon you rust in my absence ! You 
don’t understand yet ? Those fellows who were here one 
night. They are the scouts I speak of.” 

“ How long has this been going on ? ” asked Lightwood. 

“ I apprehend it has been going on ever since a certain 
person went oflf.” 

“Do you think they suppose you have inveigled her 
away ? ” 

“ My dear Mortimer, you know the absorbing nature of 
my professional occupations ; I really have not had leisure 
to think about it.” 

“ Have you asked them what they want ? Have you ob- 
jected?” 

“ Why should I ask them what they want, dear fellow, 
when I am indifierent what they want ? Why should I ex- 
press objection, when I don’t object ? ” 

“ You are in your most reckless mood. But you called 
the situation just now, a ludicrous one ; and most men object 
to that, even those who are indifferent to everything else.” 

“You charm me, Mortimer, with your reading of my 
weaknesses. I own to the weakness of objecting to occupy 
a ludicrous position, and therefore I transfer the position to 
the scouts. I goad the schoolmaster to madness. I make 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND 


219 


the schoolmaster so ridiculous, and so aware of being made 
ridiculous, that I see him chafe and fret at every pore when 
we cross one another. The amiable occupation has been 
the solace of my life, since I was baulked in the manner un- 
necessary to recall. I do it thus : I stroll out after dark, 
stroll a little way, look in at a window and furtively look out 
for the schoolmaster. Sooner or later, I perceive the school- 
master on the watch ; sometimes accompanied by his hope- 
ful pupil; oftener, pupil-less. Having made sure of his 
watching me, I tempt him on, all over London. One night I 
go east, another night north, in a few nights I go all round 
the compass. Sometimes, I walk ; sometimes, I proceed in 
cabs, draining the pocket of the schodlmaster, who then fol- 
lows in cabs. I study and get up abstruse No Thoroughfares 
in the course of the day. With Venetian mystery I seek 
those No Thoroughfares at night, glide into them by means 
of dark courts, tempt the schoolmaster to follow, turn sud- 
denly, and catch him before he can retreat. Then we face 
one another, and I pass him as unaware of his existence, and 
he undergoes grinding torments. Similarly, I walk at a 
great pace down a short street, rapidly turn the corner, and, 
getting out of his view, as rapidly turn back. I catch him 
coming on post, again pass him as unaware of his existence, 
and again he undergoes grinding torments. Night after 
night his disappointment is acute, but hope springs eternal in 
the scholastic breast, and he follows me again to-morrow. 
Thus I enjoy the pleasures of the chase, and derive great 
benefit from the healthful exercise. When I do not enjoy 
the pleasures of the chase, for anything I know, he watches 
at the Temple Grate all night.” 

This is an extraordinary story,” observed Lightwood. 
don’t like it.” 

You are a little hipped, dear fellow,” said Eugene ; “ you 
have been too sedentary. Come and enjoy the pleasures of 
the chase.” 

“ Do you mean that you believe he is watching now ? ” 

“ I have not the slightest doubt he is.” 

‘‘ Have you seen him to-night ? ” 

“ I forgot to look for him when I was last out,” returned 
Eugene with the calmest indifference ; “ but I dare say he 


220 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


was there. Come! Be a British sportsman and enjoy the 
pleasures of the chase. It will do you good.” 

Lightwood hesitated ; but, yielding to his curiosity, rose. 

Bravo!” cried Eugene, rising too. “Or, if Yoicks 
would be in better keeping, consider that I said Yoicks. 
Look to your feet, Mortimer, for we shall try your boots. 
When you are ready, I am — need I say with a Hey Ho Chi- 
vey, and likewise with a Hark Forward, Hark Forward, 
Tantivy ? ” 

“ Will nothing make you serious ? ” said Mortimer. 

“ I am always serious, but just now I am a little excited by 
the glorious fact that a southerly wind and a cloudy sky pro- 
claim a hunting evening. Beady ? So. We turn out the 
lamp and shut the door, and take the field.” 

As the two friends passed out of the Temple into the pub- 
lic street, Eugene demanded with a show of courteous pat- 
ronage in which direction Mortimer would like the run to 
be ? “ There is a rather difficult country about Bethnal 

Grreen,” said Eugene, “ and we have not taken in that direc- 
tion lately. What is your opinion of Bethnal Green ? ” 
Mortimer assented to Bethnal Green, and they turned east- 
ward. “How, when we come to St. Paul’s church-yard,” 
pursued Eugene, “ we’ll loiter artfully, and I’ll show you the 
schoolmaster.” But they both saw him, before they got 
there ; alone, and stealing after them in the shadow of the 
houses, on the opposite side of the way. 

“Get your wind,” said Eugene, “for I am off directly. 
Does it occur to you that the boys of Merry England will be- 
gin, to deteriorate in an educational light, if this lasts long ? 
The schoolmaster can’t attend to me and the boys too. Got 
your wind ? I am off! ” 

At what a rate he went, to breathe the schoolmaster ; and 
how he then lounged and loitered, to put his patience to an- 
other kind of wear ; what preposterous ways he took with 
no other object on earth than to disappoint and punish him ; 
and how he wore him out by every piece of ingenuity that 
his eccentric humor could devise ; all this Lightwood noted, 
with a feeling of astonishment that so careless a man could 
be so wary, and that so idle a man could take so much 
trouble. At last, far on in the third hour of the pleasures of 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


221 


the chase, when he had brought the poor dogging wretch 
I'ound again into the City, he twisted Mortimer up a few 
dark entries, twisted him into a little square court, twisted 
him sharp round again, and they almost ran against Bradley 
Headstone. 

“ And you see, as I was saying, Mortimer,” remarked Eu- 
gene aloud with the utmost coolness, as though there were 
no one Avithin hearing but themselves : “ and you see, as I 
was saying — undergoing grinding torments.” 

It was not too strong a phrase for the occasion. Looking 
like the hunted and not the hunter, baffled, worn, with the 
exhaustion of deferred hope and consuming hate and anger 
in his face, wfflite-lipped, wild-eyed, draggle-haired, seamed 
with jealousy and anger, and torturing himself with the con- 
viction that he showed it all and they exulted in it, he went 
by them in the dark, like a haggard head suspended in the 
air : so completely did the force of his expression cancel his 
figure. 


CHAPTER XXXYIII. 

B affled, exasperated, and Aveary, Bradley Headstone 
lingered opposite the Temple gate Avhen it closed on 
Wrayburn and LightAVOod, debating with himself should he 
go home for that time or should he watch longer. Possessed 
in his jealousy by the fixed idea that Wrayburn was in the 
secret, if it Avere not altogether of his contriving, Bradley 
was as confident of getting the better of him at last by sul- 
lenly sticking to him, as he would have been — and often had 
been — of mastering any piece of study in the Avay of his vo- 
cation, by the like slow persistent process. 

The suspicion crossed him as he rested in a door-way with 
his eyes upon the Temple gate, that perhaps she was even 
concealed in that set of Chambers. It would furnish an- 
other reason for Wrayburn’s purposeless walks, and it might 
be. He thought of it and thought of it, until he resolved to 
steal up the stairs, if the gate-keeper Avould let him through, 
and listen. So the haggard head suspended in the air flitted 
across the road, like the spectre of one of the many heads 
erst hoisted upon neighboring Temple Bar, and stopped be- 
fore the watchman. 


222 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


The watchman looked at it, and asked : “ Who for ? ’’ 

Mr. Wray burn.” 

“ It’s very late.” 

“ He came back with Mr. Lightwood, I know, near upon 
two hours ago. But if he has gone to bed. I’ll put a paper in 
his letter-box. I am expected.” 

The haggard head floated up the dark staircase, and softly 
descended nearer to the floor outside the outer door of the 
chambers. 

“Hot there, but she might have been.” The head arose 
to its former height from the ground, floated down the stair- 
case again, and passed on tc the gate. A man was standing 
there, in parley with the watchman. 

As Bradley passed out at the gate with an undecided foot, 
he heard it shut behind him, and heard the footstep of the 
man coming after him. 

“ ’ Sense me,” said the man, who appeared to have been 
drinking, and rather stumbled at him than touched him, to 
attract his attention; “but might you be acquainted with 
the T’other Grovernor ? ” 

“ I don’t know what you mean.” 

“ Why, look here. There’s two Grovernors, ain’t there ? 
One and one, two — Lawyer Lightwood, my first finger, he’s 
one, ain’t he? Well; might you be acquainted with my 
middle finger, the T’other ? ” 

“ I know quite as much of him as I want to know.” 

“ Hooroar ! ” cried the man. “ Hooroar, T’other t’other 
Grovernor. Hooroar, T’otherest Grovernor ! I am of your 
way of thinkin.” 

“ Don’t make such a noise at this dead hour of the night. 
What are you talking about ? ” 

“ Look here, T’otherest Governor,” replied the man, be- 
coming hoarsely confidential. “ The T’other Governor he’s 
always joked his jokes agin me, owing, as I believe, to my 
being a honest man as gets my living by the sweat of my 
brow. Which he ain’t, and he don’t.” 

Casting about for any way or help toward the discovery 
on which he was concentrated, Bradley Headstone replied : 
“You needn’t take ofiense, I didn’t mean to stop you. You 
were too loud in the open street ; that was all.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


223 


“ T’otlierest Grovemor,” replied Mr. Riderhood, mollified 
and mysterious, “ I know wot it is to be loud, and I know 
wot it is to be soft. Wishing that your ’ealth may be better 
than your looks, which your inside must be bad indeed if it’s 
on the footing of your out.” 

Startled by the implication that his face revealed too 
much of his mind, Bradley made an effort to clear his brow. 

“ You call at the Temple late,” he remarked, with a lum- 
bering show of ease. 

“Wish I may die,” cried Mr. Riderhood, with a hoarse 
laugh, “if I warn’t a-going" to say the self-same words to 
you, T’otherest Governor ! ” 

“ It chanced so with me,” said Bradley, looking discon- 
certedly about him. 

“ And it chanced so with me,” said Riderhood. “ But I 
don’t mind telling you how. I’m a Deputy Lock-keeper up 
the river, and I was off duty yes’day, and I shall be on to- 
morrow, and I come to London to look arter my private af- 
fairs. My private affairs is to get appinted to the Lock as 
reg’lar keeper at fust hand, and to have the law of a busted 
B’low-Bridge steamer which drownded of me. I ain’t a-go- 
ing to be drownded and not paid for it! And when you 
mention the middle of the night, T’otherest Governor, 
throw your eye on this here bundle under my arm, and bear 
in mind that I’m a-walking back to my Lock, and that the 
Temple laid upon my line of road.” 

Bradley Headstone’s face had changed during this latter 
recital, and he had observed the speaker with a more sus- 
tained attention. 

“ Do you know,” said he, after a pause, during which they 
walked side by side, “ that I believe I could tell you your 
name, if I tried ? ” 

“Prove your opinion,” was the answer, accompanied 
with a stop and a stare. “ Try.” 

“ Your name is Riderhood.” 

“ I’m blest if it ain’t. But I don’t know your’n.” 

“ That’s quite another thing. I never supposed you did. 
Where is your lock ? ” 

“ Twenty mile and odd — call it five-and-twenty mile and 
odd, if you like — up stream, ’ ’ was the sullen reply. 


224 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ How is it called ? ” 

“ Plashwater Weir Mill Lock.” 

“ Suppose I was to offer you five shillings ; what then ? ” 

“ Why, then, I’d take it,” said Mr. Riderhood. 

The schoolmaster put his hand in his pocket, and pro- 
duced two half-crowns, and placed them in Mr. Riderhood’s 
palm. 

“ There’s one thing about you, T’otherest G-overnor,” 
said Riderhood, faring on again, “ as looks well and goes fur. 
You’re a ready money man. But what do you want for it ? ” 
“ I don’t know that I want anything for it. Y ou have no 
good-will towards this Wray burn,” said Bradley. 

No.” 

“ Neither have I.” 

Riderhood nodded, and asked : “ Is it for that ? ” 

“ It’s as much for that as anything else. It’s something to 
be agreed with, on a subject that occupies so much of one’s 
thoughts. Let me ask you a question. I know something 
more than your name about you ; I knew something about 
Gaffer Hexam. When did you last set eyes upon his daugh- 
ter ? ” 

“ When did I last set eyes upon his daughter, T’otherest 
Governor ? ” repeated Mr. Riderhood, growing intention- 
ally slower of comprehension as the other quickened in his 
speech. 

“ Yes. — Not to speak to her. To see her — ^any where ? ” 
The Rogue had got the clue he wanted, though he held it 
with a clumsy hand. “ I ain’t set eyes upon her — never 
once — not since the day of Gaffer’s death.” 

‘‘You know her well, by sight ? ” 

“ I should think I did ! No one better.” 

“ And you know him as well ? ” 

“ Who’s him? ” asked Riderhood. 

“ Curse the name ! Is it so agreeable to you that you want 
to hear it again ? ” 

“ Oh ! Him ! ” said Riderhood, who had craftily worked 
the schoolmaster into this corner, that he might again take 
note of his face under its evil possession. “ I’d know him 
among a thousand.” 

“ Did you — ” Bradley tried to ask it quietly : but do what 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


225 


he might with his voice, he could not subdue his face ; — did 
you ever see them together ? ” 

(The Rogue had got the clue in both hands now.) 

“ I see ’em together, T’otherest Governor, on the very day 
when Gaffer was towed ashore.” 

“Well! was he insolent to her too?” asked Bradley 
after a struggle. “ Or did he make a show of being kind to 


her?” 


“ He made a show of being most uncommon kind to her,” 
said Riderhood. “ By George ! now I think of it, pr’aps he 
went and took me down wrong, a purpose, on account o’ be- 
ing sweet upon her I ” 

Bradley asked Riderhood point-blank if he knew where 
she was. Clearly, he did not know. He asked Riderhood 
if he would be willing, in case any intelligence of her or of 
Wray burn as seeking her or associating with her, should fall 
in his way, to communicate it if it were paid for ? He would 
be very willing indeed. He was “ agin ’em both,” he said 
with an oath, and for why ? ’Cause they both stood betwixt 
him and his getting his living by the sweat of his brow. 


CHAPTER XXXIX. 


P came the sun, streaming all over London, and in its 



u glorious impartiality even condescending to make pris- 
matic sparkles in the whiskers of Mr. Alfred Lammle as he 
sat at breakfast. In need of some brightening from with- 
out, was Mr. Alfred Lammle, for he had the air of being dull 
enough within, and looked grievously discontented. 

Mrs. Alfred Lammle faced her lord. 

“ It seems to me,” said she, “ that you have had no money 
at all, ever since we have been married.” 

“ What seems to you,” said Mr. Lammle, “to have been 
the case, may possibly have been the case. It doesn’t mat- 
ter.” 

“ And what is to happen next ? ” asked Mrs. Lammle. 

“ Smash is to happen next. Sophronia.” 

“Well?” 

“ Attend to me, if you please. You know our league and 
covenant. We are to work together for our joint interest, 


15 


226 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


and you are as knowing a hand as I am. We shouldn’t be 
together, if you were not. W e are hemmed into a corner. 
What shall we do?” 

“ Have you no scheme on foot that will bring in any- 
thing ? ” 

Mr. Lammle plunged into his whiskers for reflection, and 
came out hopeless :* ‘‘No ; as adventurers we are obliged to 
play rash games for chances of high winnings, and there has 
been a run of luck against us.” 

“ Have you nothing — ” 

“ We, Sophronia. We, we, we.” 

“ Have we nothing to sell ? 

“ Deuce a bit. I have given a Jew a bill of sale on this fur- 
niture, and he could take it to-morrow, to-day, now. He 
would have taken it before now, I believe, but for Fledgeby.” 

“ What has Fledgeby to do with him ? ” 

“ Knew him. Cautioned me against him before I got in- 
to his claws. Couldn’t persuade him then, in behalf of some- 
body else.” 

“ Do you mean that Fledgeby has at all softened him to- 
wards you? ” 

“Us, Sophronia. Us, us, us.” 

“ Towards us ? ” 

“ I mean that the Jew has not yet done what he might 
have done, and that Fledgeby takes the credit of having got 
him to hold his hand.” 

“Do you believe Fledgeby ? ” 

“ Sophronia, I never believe anybody. I never have, my 
dear, since I believed you. But it looks hke it. If we could 
have packed the brute off with Ceorgiana ; — but however, 
that’s spilled milk.” 

“ If we could borrow money, Alfred — ” 

“ Beg money, borrow money, or steal money. It would 
be all one to us, Sophronia,” her husband struck in. 

“It is natural, Alfred,” she said, looking up with some 
timidity into his face, “ to think in such an emergency of the 
richest people we know, and the simplest.” 

“ Just so, Sophronia.” 

“TheBofflns.” 

“Just so, Sophronia.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


227 


“ Is there nothing to be done with them ? ” 

“ What is there to be done with them, Sophronia ? ” 

She cast about in her thoughts again, and he kept his eye 
upon her as before. 

Of course I have repeatedly thought of the Boffins, So- 
phronia,” he resumed, after a fruitless silence; “ but I have 
seen my way to nothing. They are well guarded. That 
infernal Secretary stands between them and — people of 
merit.” 

If he could be got rid of ? ” she said, brightening a little, 
after more casting about. 

“ Take time, Sophronia,” observed her watchful husband, 
in a patronizing manner. 

“ Leave it to me. Spare me the little carriage for to-day, 
and for to-morrow (if I don’t succeed to-day).” 

CHAPTER XL. 

H AYING- assisted at a few more expositions of the lives 
of Misers, Mr. Yenus became almost indispensable to 
the evenings at the Bower. 

The adverse destinies ordained that one evening Mr. 
Wegg’s laboring bark became beset by polysyllables, and 
embarrassed among a perfect archipelago of hard words. It 
being necessary to take soundings every minute, and to feel 
the way with the greatest caution, Mr. Wegg’s attention 
was fully employed. Advantage Avas taken of this dilemma 
by Mr. Yenus, to pass a scrap of paper into Mr. Boffin’s 
hand, and lay his finger on his own lip. 

When Mr. Boffin got home at night he found that the pa- 
per containe^l Mr. Yenus’s card and these words: “Should 
be glad to be honored with a call respecting business of your 
own, about dusk on any early evening.” 

The very next evening saw Mr. Boffin peeping in at the 
preserved frogs in Mr. Yenus’s shop-Avinclow, and saAV Mr. 
Yenus espying Mr. Boffin Avith the readiness of one on the 
alert, and beckoning that gentleman into his interior. 

“You see, Mr. Yenus, I’ve lost no time. Here I am.” 

“ Here you are, sir,” assented Mr. Yenus. 

“ I don’t like secrecy,” pursued Mr. Boffin “ — at least not 


228 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


in a general way I don’t — but I dare say you’ll show me 
good reason for being secret so far.” 

“ I think I shall, sir,” returned Venus. 

“Grood,” said Mr. Boffin. “You don’t expect Wegg, I 
take it for granted ? ” 

“ No, sir. Mr. Boffin, if I confess to you that I fell into a 
proposal of which you were the subject, and of which you 
oughtn’t to have been the subject, you will allow me to men- 
tion, and will please take into favorable consideration, that I 
was in a crushed state of mind at the time. Not that I was 
ever hearty in it, sir,” the penitent anatomist went on, “ or 
that I ever viewed myself with anything but reproach, for 
having turned out of the paths of science into the paths 
of — ” he was going to say “ villainy,” but, unwilling to press 
too hard upon himself, substituted with great emphasis — 
“Weggery.” 

Placid and whimsical of look as ever, Mr. Boffin answer- 
ed : “ Quite so, Venus.” 

“ And now, sir,” said Venus, “ having prepared your mind 
in the rough, I will articulate the details.” With which brief 
professional exordium, he entered on the history of the 
friendly move, and truly recounted it. 

When Venus passed to Wegg’s discovery, and from that 
to their having both seen Mr. Boffin dig up the Dutch bottle, 
that gentleman changed color, changed his attitude, became 
extremely restless, and ended (when V enus ended) by being 
in a state of manifest anxiety, trepidation, and confusion. 

“Now, sir,” said Venus, finishing off; “you best know 
what was in that Dutch bottle, and why you dug it up, and 
took it away. I don’t pretend to know anything more 
about it than I saw. All I know is this : As the best amends 
I can make you for having ever gone into it, I make known 
to you, as a warning, what Wegg has found out. My opin- 
ion is, that Wegg is not to be silenced at a modest price, 
and I build that opinion on his beginning to dispose of your 
property the moment he knew his power. Whether it’s 
worth your while to silence him at any price, you will decide 
for yourself, and take your measures accordingly. As far 
as I am concerned, I have no price. If I am ever called up- 
on for the truth, I tell it, but I want to do no more than I 
have now done and ended.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


229 


Thank’ ee, Yenus ! ” said Mr. Boffin with a hearty grip of 
his hand ; “ thank’ee, Yenus, thank’ee, Yenus ! ” And then 
walked up and down the little shop in great agitation. But 
look here, Yenus,” he by-and-by resumed, nervously sitting 
down again : I have to buy Wegg up, I shan’t buy him 

any cheaper for your being out of it. Instead of his having 
half the money — it was to have been half, I suppose ? Share 
and share alike ? ” 

“ It was to have been half, sir,” answered Yenus. 

Instead of that, he’ll now have all. I shall pay the same, 
if not more. For you tell me he’s an unconscionable dog, a 
ravenous rascal.” 

He is,” said Yenus. 

Don’t you think, Yenus,” insinuated Mr. Boffin, after 
looking at the fire for a while — “ don’t you feel as if — you 
might like to pretend to be in it till Wegg was bought up, 
and then ease your mind by handing over to me what you 
had made believe to pocket ? ” 

Ho I don’t, sir,” returned Yenus, very positively. 

“ Hot to make amends ? ” insinuated Mr. Boffin. 

“ Ho, sir. It seems to me, after maturely thinking it over, 
that the best amends for having got out of the square is to 
get back into the square.” 

Humph ! When you say the square, you mean — ” 

“ I mean,” said Yenus, stoutly and shortly, “ the right.” 

It appears to me,” said Mr. Boffin, grumbling over the 
fire in an injured manner, that the right is with me, if it’s 
anywhere. And how am I to live, if I’m to be going buying 
fellows up out of the little that I’ve got ? And how am I to 
set about it ? When am I to get my money ready ? When 
am I to make a bid ? You haven’t told me when he threat- 
ens to drop down upon me.” 

Yenus explained under what conditions, and with what 
views, the dropping down upon Mr. Boffin was held over 
until the Mounds should be cleared away. Mr. Boffin lis- 
tened attentively, “ I suppose,” said he, with a gleam of 
hope, there’s no doubt about the genuineness and date of 
this confounded will ? ” 

“ Hone whatever,” said Mr. Yenus. 

Where might it be deposited at present?” asked Mr. 
Boffin, in a wheedling tone. 


230 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ It’s in my possession, sir.” 

“ Is it ? ” he cried, with great eagerness. “ How, for any 
liberal sum of money that could be agreed upon, Venus, 
would you put it in the fire ? ” 

“ Ho sir, I wouldn’t,” said Mr. Venua 
“ Hor pass it over to me ? ” 

“ That would be the same thing. Ho, sir.” 

The Golden Dustman seemed about to pursue these ques- 
tions, when a stumping noise was heard outside, coming 
towards the door. ‘‘Hush! here’s Wegg!” said Venus. 
“ Get behind the young alligator in the corner, Mr. Boffin, 
and judge him for yourself. Are you right, sir ? ” 

Mr. Boffin had but whispered an affirmative response, 
when Wegg came stumping in. “ Partner,” said that gen- 
tleman in a sprightly manner, “ how’s yourself ? ” 

“ Tolerable,” said Mr. Venus. “Hot much to boast of.” 

“ In-deed 1 ” said Wegg : “ sorry, partner, that you’re not 
picking up faster, but your soul’s too large for your body, 
sir ; that’s where it is. And how’s our stock in trade, part- 
ner ? Safe bind, safe find, partner ? Is that about it ? ” 

“ Do you wish to see it ? ” asked V enus. 

“If you please, partner,” said Wegg, rubbing his hands. 
“ I wish to see it jintly with yourself. Or, in similar words 
to some that was set to music some time back : 

I wish you to see it with your eyes 
And I will pledge with mine.’ ” 

Turning his back and turning a key, Mr. V enus produced 
the document, holding on by his usual corner. Mr. W egg, 
holding on by the opposite corner, sat down on the seat so 
lately vacated by Mr. Boffin, and looked it over. “ All right 
sir,” he slowly and unwillingly admitted, in his reluctance to 
loose his hold, “ all right 1 ” And greedily watched his part- 
ner as he turned his back again, and turned his key again. 

‘‘ There’s nothing new, I suppose ! ” said Venus, resum- 
ing his low chair behind the counter. 

“Yes there is, sir,” replied W egg ; “ there was something 
new this morning. That foxy old gjasper and griper — ” 
“Mr. Boffin?” inquired Venus, with a glance towards 
the alligator’s yard or two of smile. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


231 


“ Mister be bio wed ! ” cried Wegg, yielding to his honest 
indignation. Boffin. Dusty Boffin. That foxy old grunt- 
er and grinder, sir, turns into the yard this morning, to med- 
dle with our property, a menial tool of his own, a young man 
by the name of Sloppy. Ecod, when I say to him, ^ What do 
you want here, young man ? This is a private yard, ’ he pulls 
out a paper from Boffin’s other blackguard, the one I was 
passed over for, ‘ This is to authorize Sloppy to overlook 
the carting and to watch the work.’ That’s pretty strong, I 
think, Mr. Venus ? ” 

“ Remember he doesn’t know yet of our claim on the 
property,” suggested Venus. 

‘‘Then he must have a hint of it,” said Wegg,- “and a 
strong one that’ll jog his terrors a bit. G-ive him an inch, 
and he’ll take an ell. Let him alone this time, and what’ll he 
do with our property next ? I tell you what, Mr. Venus, it 
comes to this ; I must be overbearing with Boffin, or I shall 
fly into several pieces. I can’t contain myself when I look 
at him. Every time I see him putting his hand in his pock- 
et, I see him putting it into my pocket. Every time I hear 
him jingling his money, I hear him taking liberties with my 
money. Flesh and blood can’t bear it. No,” said Mr. 
Wegg, greatly exasperated, “ and I’ll go further. A wood- 
en leg can’t bear it I ” 

“But, Mr. Wegg,” urged Venus, “it was your own idea 
that he should not be exploded upon, till the Mounds were 
carted away.” 

“But it was likewise my idea, Mr. Venus,” retorted 
Wegg, “that if he came sneaking and sniffing about the 
property, he should be threatened, given to understand that 
he has no right to it, and be made our slave. Wasn’t that 
my idea, Mr. Venus ? ” 

“ It certainly was, Mr. Wegg.” 

“It certainly was, as you say, partner,” assented Wegg, 
put into a better humor by the ready admission. “Very 
well. -I consider his planting one of his menial tools in the 
yard, an act of sneaking and sniffing. And his nose shall be 
put to the grindstone for it.” 

“It was not your fault, Mr. Wegg, I must admit,” said 
Venus, “ that he got off with the Dutch bottle that night.” 


232 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


As you handsomely say again, partner ! Ko, it was not 
my fault. I’d have had that bottle out of him. W as it to be 
borne that he should come, like a thief in the dark, digging 
among stuff that was far more ours, than his (seeing that we 
could deprive him of every grain of it, if he didn’t buy us at 
our own figure), and carrying off treasure from its bowels ? 
No, it was not to be borne. ; And, for that, too, his nose shall 
be put to the grindstone.” 

“ How do you propose to do it, Mr. Wegg ? ” 

“ To put his nose to the grindstone ? I propose,” returned 
that estimable man, “ to insult him openly. And, if looking 
into this eye of mine, he dares to offer a word in answer, to 
retort upon him before he can take his breath, ‘ Add atiother 
word to that, you dusty old dog, and you’re a beggar.’ ” 

“ Suppose he says nothing, Mr. Wegg ? ” 

“ Then,” replied Wegg, we shall have come to an under- 
standing with very little trouble, and I’ll break him and drive 
him, Mr. Y enus. I’ll put him in harness, and I’ll bear him up 
tight, and I’ll break him and drive him. The harder the old 
Dust is driven, sir, the higher he’ll pay. And I mean to be 
paid high, Mr. Yenus, I promise you.” 

“ You speak quite revengefully, Mr. Wegg.” 

“ Revengefully, sir? Mr. Yenus, perhaps I’m duller and 
savager than usual. Perhaps I have allowed myself to brood 
too much. Begone, dull Care ! ’Tis gone, sir. I’ve looked 
in upon you, and empire resumes her sway. For, as the 
song says — subject to your correction, sir — 

‘ When the heart of a man is depressed with cares. 

The mist is dispelled if Venus appears. 

Like the notes of a fiddle, you sweetly, sir, sweetly. 

Raises our spirits and charms our ears,’ 


Grood-night, sir.” 

“ That’s a treacherous fellow,” said Mr. Boffin, dusting his 
arms and legs as he came forth, the alligator having been but 
musty company. ‘‘ That’s a dreadful fellow.” 

“ The alligator, sir ? ” said Yenus. 

“No, Yenus, no. The Serpent.” 

“ You’ll have the goodness to notice, Mr. Boffin,” remark- 
ed Yenus, •“ that I said nothing to him about my going out of 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


233 


the aflfair altogether, because I didn’t wish to take you any- 
ways by surprise. But I can’t be too soon out of it for my 
satisfaction, Mr. Boffin, and I now put it to you when it will 
suit your views for me to retire ? ” 

“Thank’ee, Venus, thank’ee, Venus; but I don’t know 
what to say,” returned Mr. Boffin, “I don’t know what to 
do. He’Ll drop down on me, anyway. He seems fully deter- 
mined to drop down ; don’t he?” 

Mr. Venus opined that such was clearly his intention. 

“ You might be a sort of protection for me, if you remain- 
ed to it,” said Mr. Boffin; “you might stand betwixt him 
and me, and take the edge off him. Don’t you feel as if you 
could make a show of remaining in it, Venus, till I had time 
to turn myself round.” 

Venus naturally inquired how long Mr. Boffin thought it 
might take him to turn himself round ? 

“ I am sure I don’t know,” was the answer, given quite at 
a loss. “ Everything is so at sixes and sevens. When you 
do go out of it, how do you mean to go ? ” 

Venus replied that as Wegghad found the document and 
handed it to him, it was his intention to hand it back to 
Wegg, with the declaration that he himself would have 
nothing to say to it, or do with it, and that Wegg must act 
as he chose, and take the consequences. 

“ How long could you be persuaded to keep up the ap- 
pearance of remaining in it ? ” asked Mr. Boffin, retiring on 
his other idea. “ Could you be got to do so, till the Mounds 
are gone ? ” 

No. That would protract the mental uneasiness of Mr. 
V enus too long, he said. 

“ Not if I was to show you reason now ? ” demanded Mr. 
Boffin ; “ not if I was to show you good and sufficient rea- 
son ? ” 

If by good and sufficient reason Mr. Boffin meant honest 
and unimpeachable reason, that might weigh with Mr. 
Venus against his personal wishes and convenience. 

“Come and see me, Venus,” said Mr. Boffin, “at my 
house.” 

“ Is the reason there, sir ? ” asked Mr. Venus, with an in- 
credulous smile and blink. 


234 


CONDENSED CLASSICS, 


“It may be, or may not be,” said Mr. Boffin, “just as you 
view it. But in the mean time don’t go out of the matter. 
Look here. Do this. Grive me your word that you won’t 
take any steps with Wegg, without my knowledge, just as I 
have given you my word that I won’t without yours.” 

“ Done, Mr. Boffin,” said Venus. 

“ Thank’ee, Venus, thank’ee, Venus ! Done !” 

“ When shall I come to see you, Mr. Boffin ? ” 

“ When you like. The sooner the better. I must be go- 
ing now. Grood-night, V enus.” 

“ Good-night, sir.” 

Mr. Boffin was within a few streets of his own house, 
when a little private carriage, coming in the contrary direc- 
tion, passed him, turned round, and passed him again. 
When he came to the corner of his own street, there it stood 
again. 

There was a lady’s face at the window as he came up with 
this carriage, and he was passing it when ihe lady softly 
called to him by his name. 

“ I beg your pardon, ma’am ? ” said Mr. Boffin. 

“ It is Mrs. Lammle,” said the lady. 

Mr. Boffin went up to the window, and hoped Mrs. 
Lammle was well. 

“ Not very Avell, dear Mr. Boffin ; I have fluttered myself 
by being — perhaps foolishly — uneasy and anxious. I have 
been waiting for you for some time. Can I speak to you ? ” 

Mr. Boffin proposed that Mrs. Lammle should drive on to 
his house, a few hundred yards further. 

“ I would rather not, Mr. Boffin, unless you particularly 
wish it. I feel the difficulty and delicacy of the matter so 
much that I would rather avoid speaking to you at your own 
home. W ould you mind coming into the carriage ? ” 

Mr. Boffin answered, “Not at all,” and took his seat at 
Mrs. Lammle’s side. 

“Drive slowly anywhere,” Mrs. Lammle called to her 
coachman, “ and don’t let the carriage rattle.” 

“ It must be more dropping down, I think,” said Mr. Boh 
fin to himself. “ What next ? ” 


OUn MUTUAL FRIEND. 


235 


CHAPTER XLI 



HE breakfast table at Mr. Boffin’s was usually a very 


JL pleasant one, and was always presided over by Bella. 
As though he began each new day in his healthy natural 
character, and some waking hours were necessary to his re- 
lapse into the corrupting influences of his wealth, the face 
and the demeanor of the Grolden Dustman were generally 
unclouded at that meal. 

But, one morning long to be remembered, it was black 
midnight with the Golden Dustman when he first appeared. 
His altered character had never been so grossly marked. 
His bearing towards his Secretary was so charged with inso- 
lent distrust and arrogance, that the latter rose and left the 
table before breakfast was half done. The look he directed 
at the Secretary’s retiring figure was so cunningly malig- 
nant, that Bella would have sat astounded and indignant, 
even though he had not gone the length of secretly threaten- 
ing Rokesmith with his clenched fist as he closed the door. 
This unlucky morning, of all mornings in the year, was the 
morning next after Mr. Boffin’s interview with Mrs. Lammle 
in her little carriage. 

It was far on in the afternoon when, Bella being in her 
own room, a servant brought her a message from Mr. Boffin 
begging her to come to his. 

Mrs. Boffin was there, seated on a sofa, and Mr. Boffin 
was jogging up and down. On seeing Bella he stopped, 
beckoned her to him, and drew her arm through his. 
‘‘Don’t be alarmed, my dear,” he said, gently; “I am not 
angry with you. Why, you actually tremble ! Don’t be 
alarmed, Bella my dear. I’ll see you righted.” 

“ See me righted, sir ? ” 

“Ay, ay! ” said Mr. Boffin. “See you righted. Send 
Mr. Rokesmith here, you sir.” 

Bella would have been lost in perplexity if there had been 
pause enough ; but the servant found Mr. Rokesmith near at 
hand, and he almost immediately presented himsefl:. 

“ Shut the door, sir 1 ” said Mr. Boffin. “ I have got some- 
thing to say to you which I fancy you will not be pleased to 
hear.” 


236 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


I am sorry to reply, Mr. Boffin,” returned the Secretary, 
as, having closed the door, he turned and faced him, “ that it 
has become no novelty to me to hear from your lips vi^hat I 
would rather not hear.” 

‘‘ Now, sir,” said Mr. Boffin, “look at this young lady on 
my arm. How dare you, sir, tamper, unknown to me, with 
this young lady ? How dare you come out of your station, 
and your place in my house, to pester this young lady with 
your impudent addresses ? ” 

“ I must decline to answer questions,” said the Secretary, 
“ that are so offensively asked.” 

“You decline to answer?” retorted Mr. Boffin. “You 
decline to answer, do you ? Then I’ll tell you what it is, 
Rokesmith ; I’ll answer for you. There are two sides to this 
matter, and I’ll take ’em separately. The first side is, sheer 
Insolence. That’s the first side.” 

The Secretary smiled with some bitterness, as though he 
would have said, “ So I see and hear.” 

“ It was sheer Insolence in you, I tell you,” said Mr. Bof- 
fin, “ even to think of this young lady. This young lady 
was far above you. This young lady was no match for you. 
This young lady was lying in wait (as she was qualified to 
do) for money, and you had no money.” 

Bella hung her head and seemed to shrink a little from Mr. 
Boffin’s protecting arm. 

“ What are you, I should like to know,” pursued Mr. Bof- 
fin, “ that you were to have the audacity to follow up this 
young lady ? This young lady was looking about the mar- 
ket for a good bid ; she wasn’t in it to be snapped up by fel- 
lows that had no money to lay out ; nothing to buy with.” 

“ Oh, Mr. Boffin ! Mrs. Boffin, pray say something for 
me ! ” murmured Bella, disengaging her arm, and covering 
her face with her hands. 

“ Old lady,” said Mr. Boffin, anticipating his wife, “you 
hold your tongue. Bella, my dear, don’t you let yourself be 
put out. I’ll right you.” 

“ But you don’t, you don’t right me ! ” exclaimed Bella, 
with great emphasis. “You wrong me, wrong me ! ” 

“ Don’t you be put out, my dear,” complacently retorted 
Mr. Boffin. “ I’ll bring this young man to book. Now, you 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


237 


Rokesmith ! You can’t decline to hear, you know, as well 
as to answer. You hear me tell you that the first side of 
your conduct was Insolence — Insolence and Presumption. 
Answer me one thing, if you can. Didn’t this young lady 
tell you so herself ? ” 

“ Did I, Mr. Rokesmith? ” asked Bella with her face still 
covered. 0 say, Mr. Rokesmith ! Did I ? ” 

Don’t be distressed, Miss Wilfer ; it matters very little 
now.” 

‘‘ Ah ! You can’t deny it, though ! ” said Mr. Boffin, with 
a knowing shake of his head. 

“ But I have asked him to forgive me since,” cried Bella ; 
“ and I would ask him to forgive me now again, upon my 
knees, if it would spare him ! ” 

Here Mrs. Boffin broke out a-crying. 

“ Old lady,” said Mr. Boffin, “ stop that noise ! Tender- 
hearted in you. Miss Bella ; but I mean to have it out right 
through with this young man, having got him into a corner. 
Now, you Rokesmith. I tell you that’s one side of your 
conduct — Insolence and Presumption. Now I’m a-coming 
to the other, which is much worse. This was a speculation 
of yours.” 

“ I indignantly deny it.” 

“It’s of no use your denying it; it doesn’t signify a bit 
whether you deny it or not ; I’ve got a head upon my shoul- 
ders, and it ain’t a baby’s. I’m a-going to unfold your plan, 
before this young lady ; I’m a-going to show this young lady 
the second view of you ; and nothing you can say will stave 
it off. (Now, attend here, Bella, my dear.) Rokesmith, 
you’re a needy chap. You’re a chap that I pickup in the 
street. Are you, or ain’t you ? ” 

“ Gro on, Mr. Bolfin ; don’t appeal to me.’ 

“ Not appeal to yow,” retorted Mr. Boffin as if he hadn’t 
done so. “No, I should hope not! Appealing to you, 
would be rather a rum course. As I was saying, you’re a 
needy chap that I pick up in the street. Y ou come and ask 
me in the street to take you for a Secretary, and I take you. 
Very good.” 

“Very bad,” murmured the Secretary. 

“ What do you say ? ” asked Mr. Bofiin. 


238 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


He returned no answer. Mr. Boffin, after eyeing him 
with a comical look of discomfited curiosity, was fain to be- 
gin afresh. 

“ This Rokesmith is a needy young man that I take for my 
Secretary out of the open street. This Rokesmith gets ac- 
quainted with my affairs, and gets to know that I mean to 
settle a sum of money on this young lady. ‘ Oho ! ’ says 
this Rokesmith ! ” here Mr. Boffin clapped a finger against 
his nose, and tapped it several times with a sneaking air, as 
embodying Rokesmith confidentially confabulating with his 
own nose ; ‘ This will be a good haul : I’ll go in for this ! ’ 

And so this Rokesmith, greedy and hungering, begins 
a-creeping on his hands and knees towards the money. Hot 
so bad a speculation either : for if this young lady had had 
less spirit, or had had less sense, through being at all in the 
romantic line, by George, he might have worked it out and 
made it pay ! But fortunately she was too many for him, 
and a pretty figure he cuts now he is exposed. There he 
stands ! ” said Mr. Boffin, addressing Rokesmith himself with 
ridiculous inconsistency. “ Look at him ! ” 

“Your unfortunate suspicions, Mr. Boffin — ’’began the 
Secretary. 

“ Precious unfortunate for you, I can tell you,” said Mr. 
Boffin. 

“ — are not to be combated by any one, and I address my- 
self to no such hopeless task. But I will say a word upon 
the truth.” 

“ Yah ! Much you care about the truth,” said Mr. Boffin. 

“ Noddy ! My dear love ! ” expostulated his wife. 

“ Old lady,” returned Mr. Boffin, “ you keep still. I say 
to this Rokesmith here, much he cares about the truth. I 
tell him again, much he cares about the truth.” 

“ Our connection being at an end,” said the Secretary, 
“ it can be of very little moment to me what you say.” 

“ Oh! You are knowing enough,” retorted Mr. Boffin, 
with a sly look, “ to have found out that our connection’s at 
an end, eh ? But you can’t get beforehand with me. Look 
at this in my hand. This is your pay, on your discharge. 
You can only follow suit. You can’t deprive me of the lead. 
Let’s have no pretending that you discharge yourself. I 
discharge you.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


239 


“ So that I go,” remarked the Secretary, waving the point 
aside with his hand, “ it is all one to me.-” 

“ Is it ? ” said Mr. Boffin. But it’s two to me, let me tell 
you. • Allowing a fellow that’s found out to discharge him- 
self, is one thing ; discharging him for insolence and pre- 
sumption, and likewise for designs upon his master’s money, 
is another. One and one’s two ; not one. (Old lady, don’t 
you cut in. You keep still).” 

“ Have you said all you wish to say to me ? ” demanded 
the Secretary. 

“I don’t know whether I have or not,” answered Mr. 
Boffin. ‘Mt depends.” 

“ Perhaps you will consider whether there are any other 
strong expressions that you would like to bestow upon me ?” 

“ I’ll consider that,” said Mr. Boffin, obstinately, “ at my 
convenience, and not at yours. Y ou want the last word. It 
may not be suitable to let you have it.” 

“Noddy! My dear, dear Noddy I You sound so hard I ” 
cried poor Mrs. Boffin, not to be quite repressed. 

“ Old lady,” said her husband, but without harshness, “ if 
you cut in when requested not, I’ll get a pillow and carry 
you out of the room upon it. What do you want to say, you 
Rokesmith ? ” 

“ To you, Mr. Boffin, nothing. But to Miss Wilfer and to 
your good kind wife, a word.” 

“ Out with it then,” replied Mr. Boffin, “ and cut it short, 
for we’ve had enough of you.” 

“ I have borne,” said the Secretary, in a low voice, “ with 
my false position here, that I might not be separated from 
Miss Wilfer. To be near her, has been a recompense to me 
from day to day, even for the undeserved treatment I have 
had here, and for the degraded aspect in which she has often 
seen me. Since Miss WiKer rejected me, I have never again 
urged my suit, to the best of my belief, with a spoken sylla- 
ble or a look. But I have never changed in my devotion to 
her, except — if she will forgive my saying so — that it is 
deeper than it was, and better founded.” 

“ Now, mark this chap’s saying Miss Wilfer, when he 
means £ s. d. I ” cried Mr. Boffin, with a cunning wink. 
“Now, mark this chap’s making Miss Wilfer stand for 
Pounds, Shillings, and Pence! ” 


240 


CONDENSED CLASSICS, 


“My feeling for Miss Wilfer,” pursued the Secretary, 
without deigning to notice him, “ is not one to be ashamed 
of. I avow it. I love her. Let me go where I may when 
I presently leave this house, I shall go into a blank life, leav- 
ing her.” 

“ Leaving £ s. d. behind me,” said Mr. Boffin, by way of 
commentary, with another wink. 

“ That I am incapable,” the Secretary went on, still with- 
out heeding him, “ of a mercenary project, or a mercenary 
thought, in connection with Miss Wilfer, is nothing merito- 
rious in me, because any prize that I could put before my 
fancy would sink into insignificance beside her. If the 
greatest wealth or the highest rank were hers, it would only 
be important in my sight as removing her still farther from 
me, and making me more hopeless, if that could be. Say,” 
remarked the Secretary, looking full at his late master, “ say 
that with a word she could strip Mr. Boffin of his fortune and 
take possession of it, she would be of no greater worth in 
my eyes than she is.” 

“ What do you think by this time, old lady,” asked Mr. 
Boffin, turning to his wife in a bantering tone, “ about this 
Eokesmith here, and his caring for the truth ? Y ou needn’ t 
say what you think, my dear, because I don’t want you to 
cut in, but you can think it all the same. As to taking pos- 
session of my property, I warrant you he wouldn’t do that 
himself if he could.” 

“No,” returned the Secretary, with another full look. 

“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Mr. Boffin. “There’s nothing 
like a good ’un while you are about it.” 

“ I have been for a moment,” said the Secretary, turning 
from him and falling into his former' manner, “ diverted 
from the little I have to say. My interest in Miss Wilfer be- 
gan when I first saw her : even began when I had only heard 
of her. It was, in fact, the cause of my throwing myself in 
Mr. Boffin’s way, and entering his service. Miss Wilfer has 
never known this until now. I mention it now, only as a 
corroboration (though I hope it may be needless) of my be- 
ing free from the sordid design attributed to me.” 

“Now, this is a very artful dog,” said Mr. Boffin, with a 
deep look ; “ this is a longer-headed schemer than I thought 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


241 


him. See how patiently and methodically he goes to work. 
He gets to know about me and my property, and about this 
young lady, and her share in poor young John’s story, and 
he puts this and that together, and he says to himself, • I’ll 
get in with Boffin, and I’ll get in with this young lady, and 
I’ll work ’em both at the same time, and I’ll bring my pigs to 
market somewhere.’ I hear him say it, bless you ! Why, I 
look at him now, and I see him say it ! ” 

Mr. Boffin pointed at the culprit, as it were in the act, and 
hugged himself in his great penetration. 

‘‘But luckily he hadn’t to deal with the people he sup- 
posed, Bella, my dear! ” said Mr. Boffin. “No! Luckily 
he had to deal with you, and with me, and with Daniel and 
Miss Dancer, and with Elwes, and with Yulture Hopkins, 
and with Blewbury Jones and all the rest of us, one down 
t’other come on. And he’s beat ; that’s what he is ; regular- 
ly beat. He thought to squeeze money out of us, and he 
has done for himself instead, Bella my dear ! ” 

Bella my dear made no response, gave no sign of acquies- 
cence. When she had first covered her face she had sunk 
upon a chair with her hands resting on- the back of it, and had 
never moved since. 

“There’s your pay, Mr. Rokesmith,” said the Grolden 
Dustman, jerking the folded scrap of paper he had in his 
hand, towards his late Secretary. “ I dare say you can stoop 
to pick it up, after what you have stooped to here.” 

“I have stooped to nothing but this,” Rokesmith an- 
swered as he took it from the ground ; “ and this is mine, for 
I have earned it by the hardest of hard labor.” 

“ You’re a pretty quick packer, I hope,” said Mr, Boffin ; 
“ because the sooner you are gone, bag and baggage, the bet- 
ter for all parties.” 

“ You need have no fear of my lingering.’* 

“ There’sjust one thing though,” said Mr. Boffin, “ that I 
should like to ask you before we come to a good riddance.” 

“ Ask me anything you wish to ask,” returned Rokesmith, 
“ but use the expedition that you recommend.” 

“ You pretend to have a mighty admiration for this young 
lady ? ” said Mr. Boffin, laying his hand protectingly on BeL 
la’s head without looking down at her. 

16 


242 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ I do not pretend.” 

“Oh! Well. You have a mighty admiration for this 
young lady — since you are so particular ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ How do you reconcile that with this young lady’s being 
a weak-spirited, improvident idiot, not knowing what was 
due to herself, flinging up her money to the church-weather- 
cocks, and racing off* at a splitting pace for the workhouse ? ” 

“ I don’t understand you.” 

“ Don’t you ? Or won’t you ? What else could you have 
made this young lady out to be, if she had listened to such 
addresses as yours ? ” 

“ What else, if I had been so happy as to win her affec- 
tions and possess her heart ? ” 

“ Win her affections,” retorted Mr. Bofiin, with ineffable 
contempt, “ and possess her heart 1 Mew says the cat. 
Quack-quack says the duck. Bow-wow-wow says the dog 1 
Win' her affections and possess her heart 1 Mew, Quack- 
quack, Bow-wow 1 ” 

John Kokesmith stared at him in his outburst, as if with 
some faint idea that he had gone mad. 

“ What is due to this young lady,” said Mr. Boffin, “ is 
Money, and this young lady right well knows it.” 

“You slander the young lady.” 

“ You slander the young lady ; you with your affections 
and hearts and trumpery,” returned Mr. Boffin. “ It’s of a 
piece with the rest of your behavior. I heard of these do- 
ings of yours only last night, or you should have heard of ’em 
from me sooner, take your oath of it. I heard of ’em from 
a lady with as good a head-piece as the best,” (a silly, boastful 
conversation with Mrs. Lammle flashed into poor Bella's 
mind) “ and she knows this young lady, and I know this 
young lady, and we all three know that it’s Money she 
makes a stand for — money-— money, money, and that you 
and your affections and hearts are a Lie, sir 1 ’’ 

“ Mrs Boffin,” said Kokesmith, quietly turning to her, 
“ for your delicate and unvarying kindness I thank you with 
the warmest gratitude. Grood-bye! Miss Wilfer, good- 
bye 1 ” 

“ And now, my dear,” said Mr. Boffin, laying his hand on 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


243 


Bella’s head again, ‘‘ you may begin to make yourself quite 
comfortable, and I hope you feel that you’ve been righted.” 

But Bella was so far from appearing to feel it, that she 
shrank from his hand and from the chair, and, starting up in 
an incoherent passion of tears, and stretching out her arms, 
cried, “ 0 Mr. Rokesmith, before you go, if you could but 
make me poor again ! 0 ! Make me poor again. Some- 

body, I beg and pray, or my heart will break if this goes on I 
Pa, dear, make me poor again and take me home ! I was 
bad enough there, but I have been so much worse here. 
Don’t give me money, Mr. Boffin, I won’t have money. 
Keep it away from me, and only let me speak to good little 
Pa, and lay my head upon his shoulder, and tell him all my 
griefs. Nobody else can understand me, nobody else can 
comfort me, nobody else knows how unworthy I am, and 
yet can love me like a little child. I am better with Pa than 
any one — more innocent, more sorry, more glad ! ” So, cry- 
ing out in a wild way that she could not bear this, Bella 
drooped her head on Mrs. Boffin’s ready breast. 

John Rokesmith from his place in the room, and Mr. Bof- 
fin from his, looked on at her in silence until she was silent 
herself. Then Mr. Boffin observed in a soothing and com- 
fortable tone, “ There, my dear, there; you are righted now, 
and it’s all right. I don’t wonder, I’m sure, at your being a 
httle flurried by having a scene with this fellow, but it’s all 
over, my dear, and you’re righted, and it’s — and it’s all 
right ! ” Which Mr. Boffin repeated with a highly satisfied 
air of completeness and finality. 

“ I hate you ! ” cried Bella, turning suddenly upon him, 
with a stamp of her little foot — “at least, I can’t hate you, 
but I don’t like you ! ” 

“ Hul — LO ! ” exclaimed Mr. Boffin in an amazed under- 
tone. 

“ You’re a scolding, unjust, abusive, aggravating, bad old 
creature ! ” cried Bella. “ I am angry with my ungrateful 
self for calling you names ; but you are, you are ; you know 
you are ! ” 

Mr. Boffin stared here, and stared there, as misdoubting 
that he must be in some sort of fit. 

“I have heard you with sliame,” said Bella. “With 


244 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


shame for myself, and with shame for you. You ought to 
be above the base tale-bearing of a time-serving woman ; 
but you are above nothing now.” 

Mr. Boffin seeming to become convinced that this was a 
fit, rolled his eyes and loosened his neckcloth. 

“ When I came here, I respected 3^ou and honored you, 
and I soon loved you,” cried Bella, and now I can’t bear 
the sight of you. At least, I don’t know that I ought to 
go so far as that — only you’re a — you’re a Monster ! ” 
Having shot this bolt out with a great expenditure of force, 
Bella hysterically laughed and cried together. 

“ The best wish I can wish you is,” said Bella, returning to 
the charge, “ that you had not one single farthing in the 
world. If any true friend and well-wisher could make you 
a bankrupt, you would be a Duck ; but as a man of property 
you are a Demon ! ” 

After despatching this second bolt with a still greater ex- 
penditure of force, Bella laughed and cried still more. 

“ Mr. Rokesmith, pray stay one moment. Pray hear one 
word from me before you go ! lam deeply sorry for the re- 
proaches you have borne on my account. Out of the depths 
of my heart I earnestly and truly beg your pardon.” 

As she stepped towards him, he met her. As she gave 
him her hand, he put it to his lips, and said, ‘‘ Ood bless 
you ! ” No laughing was mixed with Bella’s crying then; 
her tears were pure and fervent. 

“ There is not an ungenerous word that I have heard ad- 
dressed to you — heard with scorn and indignation, Mr. 
Rokesmith — but it has wounded me far more than you, for 
I have deserved it, and you never have. Mr. Rokesmith, it 
is to me you owe this perverted account of what passed be- 
tween us that night. I parted with the secret, even while I 
was angry with myseK for doing so. It was very bad in me, 
but indeed it was not wicked. I did it in a moment of con- 
ceit and folly. As I am punished for it severely, try to for- 
give it ! ” 

“ I do, with all my soul.” 

“ Thank you. 0 thank you ! Don’t part from me till I 
have said one other word, to do you justice. The only fault 
you can be truly charged with, in having spoken to me as 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


245 


you did that night — with how much delicacy and how much 
forbearance no one but I can know or be grateful to you for 
— iSj that you laid yourself open to be slighted by a worldly 
shallow girl whose head was turned, and who was quite un- 
able to rise to the worth of what you offered her. Mr. Roke- 
smith, that girl has often seen herself in a pitiful and poor 
light since, but never in so pitiful and poor a light as now, 
when the mean tone in which she answered you — sordid and 
vain girl that she was — has been echoed in her ears by Mr. 
Boffin.” 

He once more put her hand to his lips, and then relin- 
quished it, and left the room. ‘‘ He is gone,” sobbed Bella, 
indignantly, despairingly, in fifty ways at once, with her 
arms round Mrs. Boffin’s neck. He has been most shame- 
fully abused, and most unjustly and most basely driven 
away, and I am the cause of it ! ” 

Ho word, good or bad, did Mrs. Boffin say; but she ten- 
derly took care of Bella, and glanced at her husband as if for 
orders. Mr. Boffin, without imparting any, took his seat on 
a chair over against them, and there sat leaning forward, 
with a fixed countenance, his legs apart, a hand on each 
knee, and his elbows squared, until Bella should dry her eyes 
and raise her head, which in the fullness of time she did. 

“ I must go home,” said Bella. I am very grateful to you 
for all you have done for me, but I can’t stay here.” 

“ My darling girl ! ” remonstrated Mrs. Boffin. 

“No, I can’t stay here,” said Bella; “I can’t indeed. — 
Ugh ! you vicious old thing ! ” (This to Mr. Boffin.) 

“Don’t be rash, my love,” urged Mrs. Boffin. “Think 
well of what you do.” 

“ Yes, you had better think well,” said Mr. Boffin. 

“ I shall never more think well of you” cried Bella, cutting 
him short, with intense defiance in her expressive little eye- 
brows, and championship of the late Secretary in every dim- 
ple. “No. Never again ! Your money has changed you 
to marble. You are a hard-hearted Miser. You are worse 
than Dancer, worse than Hopkins, worse than Blackberry 
Jones, worse than any of the wretches. And more ! ” pro- 
ceeded Bella, breaking into tears again, “ you were wholly 
undeserving of the G-entleman you have lost.” 


246 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“Why, you don’t mean to say, Miss Bella,” the Grolden 
Dustman slowly remonstrated, “ that you setup Rokesmith 
against me ? ” 

“ i do ! ” said Bella. “ He is worth a Million of you. T 
would rather he thought well of ine, though he swept the 
street for bread, than that you did, though you splashed the 
mud upon him from the wheels of a chariot of pure gold. — ■ 
There ! ” 

“ Well I’m sure ! ” cried Mr. Boffin, staring. 

“ And for a long time past, when you have thought you 
set yourself above him, I have only seen you under his feet,” 
said Bella — “ There ! And throughout I saw in him the 
master, and I saw in you the man — There ! And when you 
used him shamefully, I took his part and loved him — There ! 
I boast of it ! ” 

After which strong avowal Bella underwent reaction, and 
cried to any extent, with her face on the back of her chair. 

“ How, look here,” said Mr. Boffin. “ Grive me your at- 
tention, Bella. I am not angry.” 

“ I am ! ” said Bella. 

“ I say,” resumed the Grolden Dustman, “ I am not angry, 
and I mean kindly to you, and I want to overlook this. So 
you’ll stay where you are, and we’ll agree to say no more 
about it.” 

“Ho, I can’t stay here,” cried Bella, rising hurriedly 
again ; “ I can’t think of staying here. I must go home for 
good.” 

“ How, don’t be silly,” Mr. Boffin reasoned. “ Don’t do 
what you’re sure to be sorry for.” 

“ I shall never be sorry for it,” said Bella ; “ and I. should 
always be sorry, and should every minute of my life despise 
myself, if I remained here after what has happened.” 

“ At least, Bella,” argued Mr. Boffin, “ let there be no mis- 
take about it. Look before you leap, you knoAv. Stay 
where you are, and all’s well, and all’s as it was to be. Gro 
away, and you can never come back.” 

“I know that I can never come back, and that’s what I 
mean,” said Bella. 

“You mustn’t expect,” Mr. Boffin pursued, “that I’m 
a-going to settle money on you, if you leave us like this, be- 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


247 


cause I am not. No, Bella ! Not one brass farthing.” 

“Expect! ” said Bella, haughtily. “Do you think that 
any power on earth could make me take it if you did, sir ? ” 

But there was Mrs. Boffin to part from, and, in the full 
flush of her dignity, the impressible little soul collapsed 
again. Down upon her knees before that good woman, she 
rocked herself upon her breast, and cried, and sobbed, and 
folded her in her arms with all her might. 

Mrs. Boffin wept most heartily, and embraced her with all 
fondness ; but said not one single word except that she was 
her dear girl. 

Bella broke from her at length, and was going weeping 
out of the room, when in her own little queer afectionate 
way, she half relented towards Mr. Boffin. 

“ I am very glad,” sobbed Bella, “ that I called you names, 
sir, because you richly deserved it. But I am very sorry 
that I called you names, because you used to be so different. 
Say good-bye ! ” 

“ Dood-bye,” said Mr. Boffin, shortly. 

“ If I knew which of your hands was the least spoiled, I 
would ask you to let me touch it,” said Bella, “ for the last 
time. But not because I repent of wffiat I have said to you. 
For I don’t It’s true ! ” 

“ Try the left hand,” said Mr. Boffin, holding it out in a 
stolid manner ; “ it’s the least used.” 

“ You have been wonderfully good and kind to me,” said 
Bella, “ and I kiss it for that. You have been as bad as bad 
could be to Mr, Rokesmith, and I throw it away for that 
Thank you for myself, and good-bye I ” 

“ Good-bye,” said Mr. Boffin as before. 

Bella caught him round the neck and kissed him, and ran 
out for ever. 

She ran up-stairs, selected those dresses she had brought 
with her, leaving all the rest, and made a great misshapen 
bundle of them, to be sent for afterwards. 

No one chanced to be about, and she got down to the hall 
in quiet. The door of the late Secretary’s room stood open. 
She peeped in as she passed, and divined from the emptiness 
of his table, and the general appearance of things, that he 
was already gone. Softly opening the great hall door, and 


248 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


softly closing it upon herself, she turned and kissed it on the 
outside — insensible old combination of wood and iron that it 
was ! — before she ran away from the house at a swift pace. 

CHAPTER XLII. 

T he City looked unpromising enough, as Bella made her 
way along its gritty streets. 

“ I never was so surprised, my dear ! ” said her father, as 
Bella appeared in his office, “ and I couldn’t believe my eyes. 
Upon my life, I thought they had taken to lying ! The idea 
of your coming down the Lane yourself ! Why didn’t you 
send the footman down the Lane, my dear ? ” 

“ I have brought no footman with me. Pa.” 

“ Oh indeed ! But you have brought the elegant turn-out, 
my love ? ” 

“No, Pa.” 

“ You never can have walked, my dear ? ” 

“ Yes, I have. Pa.” 

He looked so very much astonished, that Bella could not 
make up her mind to break it to him just yet. 

“ The consequence is, Pa, that your lovely woman feels a 
little faint, and would very much like to share your tea.” 

“ My dear child,” said her father, “ the idea of your par- 
taking of such lowly fare ! The idea of a splendid — ! ” and 
then looked at her figure, and stopped short. 

“ What’s the matter. Pa ? ” 

“ — of a splendid female,” he resumed m.ore slowly, “ put- 
ting up with such accommodation as the present ! — Is that 
a new dress you have on, my dear ? ” 

“ No, Pa, an old one. Don’t you remember it ? ” 

“ Why, I thought I remembered it, my dear ! ” 

“ You should, for you bought it. Pa ! ” 

“ Yes, I thought I bought it, my dear ! ” 

“ And have you grown so fickle that you don’t like your 
own taste, Pa, dear ? ” 

“ Well, my love,” he returned, swallowing a bit of the cot- 
tage-loaf with considerable efibrt, for it seemed to stick by 
the way : “I should have thought it was hardly sufficiently 
splendid for existing circumstances.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


249 


Bella had prepared herself to say : “ Pa, dear, don’t be 
cast down, but I must tell you something disagreeable 1 ” 
when he interrupted her in an unlooked-for manner. 

“ My gracious me ! This is very extraordinary.” 

“What is. Pa?” 

“ Why,, there’s Mr. Rokesmith now ! ” 

“ No, no, Pa, no,” cried Bella, greatly flurried. “ Surely 
not.” 

“Yes there is! Look here!” 

Sooth to say, Mr. Rokesmith not only passed the win- 
dow, but came into the counting-house. And not only 
came into the counting-house, but, finding himself alone 
there with Bella and her father, rushed at Bella and caught 
her in his arms, with the rapturous words, “ My dear, dear 
girl ; my gallant, generous, disinterested, courageous, noble 
girl ! ” And not only that even (which one might have 
thought astonishment enough for one dose), but Bella, after 
hanging her head for a moment, lifted it up and laid it on his 
breast, as if that were her head’s chosen and lasting resting- 
place ! 

“ I knew you would come to him, and I followed you,” 
said Rokesmith. .“ My love, my life ! Y ou are mine ? ” 

To which Bella responded, “ Yes, I am yours if you think 
me worth taking ! ” And after that, seemed to shrink to 
next to nothing in the clasp of his arms, partly because it 
was such a strong one on his part, and partly because there 
was such a yielding to it on hers. 

The cherub staggered back into the window-seat from 
which he had risen, and surveyed the pair with his eyes di- 
lated to their utmost. 

“ But we must think of dear Pa,” said Bella ; “ I haven’t 
told dear Pa ; let us speak to Pa.” Upon which they turned 
to do so. 

“ We’ll break it to you gently, dearest Pa,” said Bella. 

“My dear,” returned the cherub, looking at them both, 
“ you broke so much in the first — Gfush, if I may so express 
myself — that I think I am equal to a good large breakage 
now.” 

“Mr. Wilfer,” said John Rokesmith, excitedly and joy- 
fully, “ Bella takes me, though I have no fortune, even no 


250 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


present occupation ; nothing but what I can get in the life 
before us. Bella takes me ! *’ 

“Yes, I should rather have inferred, my dear sir,” re- 
turned the cherub feebly, “ that Bella took you, from what I 
have within these few minutes remarked.” 

“ You don’t know, Pa,” said Bella, “ how ill I have used 
him ! ” 

“You don’t know, sir,” said Rokesmith, “what a heart 
she has! ” 

“You don’t know. Pa,” said Bella, “what a shocking 
creature I was growing, when he saved me from myself ! ” 

“ You don’t know, sir,” said Rokesmith, “ what a sacrifice 
she has made for me 1 ” 

“ My dear Bella,” replied the cherub, still pathetically 
scared, “ and my dear J ohn Rokesmith, if you will allow me 
so to call you — ” 

“ Yes do, Pa, do 1 ” urged Bella. “ 1 allow you, and my 
will is his law. Isn’t it — dear John Rokesmith ? ” 

There was an engaging shyness in Bella, coupled with an 
engaging tenderness of love and confidence and pride, in 
thus first calling him by name, which made it quite excusa- 
ble in John Rokesmith to do what he did. What he did was 
once more to give her the appearance of vanishing as afore- 
said. 

“ I think, my dears,” observed the cherub, “ that if you 
could make it convenient to sit one on one side of me, and 
the other on the other, we should get on rather more consec- 
utively, and make things rather plainer.” This was done, 
and step by step the cherub led up to it, until all was clear. 

If the counting-house of Chicksey, Veneering, and Stob- 
bles had ever been shut up by three happier people, glad as 
most people were to shut it up, they must have been superla- 
tively happy indeed. 

The cherub apologetically remarked : “ I think, my dears, 
I’ll take the lead on the other side of the road, and seem not 
to belong to you.” Which he did, cherubically strewing the 
path with smiles, in the absence of flowers. 

It was almost ten o’clock when they stopped within view 
of Wilfer Castle ; and then, the spot being quiet and desert- 
ed, Bella began a series of disappearances which threatened 
to last all night. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


251 


“I think, John,” the cherub hinted at last, “that if you 
can spare me the young person distantly related to myself, 
I’ll take her in.” 

“ I can’t spare her,” answered J ohn, “ but I must lend her 
to you. — My Darling! ” A word of magic which caused 
Bella instantly to disappear again. 

“ Now, dearest Pa,” said Bella, when she became visible, 
“ put your hand in mine, and we’ll run home as fast as ever 
we can run, and get it over. Now, Pa. Once 1 — ” 

“ My dear,” the cherub faltered, with something of a cra- 
ven air, “ I was going to observe that if your mother — ” 

“You mustn’t hang back, sir,” cried Bella, putting out her 
right foot ; “ do you see that, sir ? That’s the mark : come 
up to the mark, sir. Once 1 Twice 1 Three times and 
away. Pa 1 ” Off she skimmed, bearing the cherub along, 
nor ever stopped, nor suffered him to stop, until she had 
pulled at the bell. “ Now, dear Pa,” said Bella, taking him 
by both ears as if he were a pitcher, and conveying his face 
to her rosy lips, “ we are in for it 1 ” 

Miss Lavvy came out to open the gate, waited on by that 
attentive cavalier and friend of the family, Mr. George 
Sampson. “ Why, it’s never Bella 1 ” exclaimed Miss Lav- 
vy, starting back at the sight. And then bawled, “Mai 
Here’s Bella ! ” 

This produced Mrs. Wilfer, who, standing in the portal, 
received them with ghostly gloom, and all her other appli- 
ances of ceremony. 

“ My child is welcome, though unlooked for,” said she, at 
the time presenting her cheek as if it were a cool slate for 
visitors to enroll themselves upon. “ You too, E. W., are 
vrelcome, though late. Does the male domestic of Mrs. 
Boffin hear me there ? ” This deep-toned inquiry was cast 
forth into the night, for response from the menial in ques- 
tion. 

“ There is no one waiting, Ma, dear,” said Bella. 

“ There is no one waiting ? ” repeated Mrs. Wilfer in ma- 
jestic accents. 

“No, Ma, dear.” 

A dignified shiver pervaded Mrs. Wilfer’s shoulders and 
gloves, as who should say, “An Enigma!” and then she 


252 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


marched at the head of the procession to the family keeping- 
room. 

Miss Lavinia, who had been intently eyeing Bella’s bon- 
net, exclaimed, Why, Bella ! ” 

“Yes, Lavvy, I know.” 

The irrepressible lowered her eyes to Bella’s dress, and 
stooped to look at it, exclaiming again : “ Why, Bella ! ” 

“ Yes, Lavvy, I know what I have got on. I was going 
to tell Ma, when you interrupted. I have left Mr. Boffin’s 
house for good, Ma, and I have come home again.” 

Mrs. Wilfer spake no word, but, having glared at her off- 
spring for a minute or two in an awful silence, retired into 
her corner of state backward, and sat down : like a frozen 
article on sale in a Russian market. 

“ In short, dear Ma,” said Bella, taking off the depreciated 
bonnet and shaking out her hair, “ I have had a very serious 
difference with Mr. Boffin on the subject of his treatment of 
a member of his household, and it’s a final difference, and 
there’s an end of all.” 

“And I am bound to tell you, my dear,” added B. W., 
submissively, “ that Bella has acted in a truly brave spirit, 
and with a truly right feeling. And therefore I hope, my 
dear, you’ll not allow yourself to be greatly disappointed.” 

“ G-eorge ! ” said Miss Lavvy, in a sepulchral, warning 
voice, founded on her mother’s : “ George Sampson, speak ! 
What did I tell you about those Boffins ? ” 

Mr. Sampson, perceiving his frail bark to 'be laboring 
among shoals and breakers, thought it safest not to refer 
back to any particular thing that he had been told, lest he 
should refer back to the wrong thing. With admirable sea- 
manship he got his bark into deep water by murmuring 
“ Yes indeed.” 

“ Yes ! I told George Sampson, as George Sampson tells 
you,” said Miss Lavvy, “ that these hateful Boffins would 
pick a quarrel with Bella, as soon as her novelty was worn 
off. Have they done it, or have they not ? W as I right, or 
was I wrong ? And what do you say to us, Bella, of your 
Boffins now ? ” 

“Lavvy and Ma,” said Bella, “ I say of Mr. and Mrs. Bof- 
fin what I always have said; and I always shall say of them 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


253 


what I always have said. But nothing will induce me to 
quarrel with any one to-night. I hope you are not sorry to 
see me, Ma dear,” kissing her ; and I hope you are not sorry 
to see me, Lavvy,” kissing her too ; “ and as I notice the let- 
tuce on the table. I’ll make the salad.” 

CHAPTER XLIIL 

A mazement sits enthroned upon the countenances of 
Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Lammle’s circle of acquaintance 
when the disposal of their first-class furniture and effects 
(including a Billiard Table in capital letters), by auction, 
under a bill of sale,” is publicly announced on a waving 
hearthrug in Sackville Street 

The camels are polishing up in the Analytical’s pantry for 
the dinner of wonderment on the occasion of the Lammles 
going to pieces, and Mr. Twemlow feels a little queer on the 
sofa at his lodgings over the stable yard in Duke Street, Saint 
James’s, in consequence of having taken two advertised 
pills at about midday, on the faith of the printed representa- 
tion accompanying the box, that the same will be found 
highly salutary as a precautionary measure in connection 
with the pleasures of the table.” ^ whom a servant enters 
with the announcement that a lady wishes to speak to him. 
A lady ! ” says Twemlow, pluming his ruffled feathers. 
Ask the favor of the lady’s name.” 

The lady’s name is Lammle. The lady will not detain Mr. 
Twemlow longer than a very few minutes. 

Show the lady in.” Lady shown in, comes in. 

Pray take a seat, Mrs. Lammle.” Mrs. Lammle takes a 
seat and opens the conversation. 

I have no doubt, Mr. Twemlow, that you have heard of 
a reverse of fortune having befallen us.” 

Mindful of the wondering dinner, Twemlow, with a little 
twinge, admits the imputation. 

Probably it wdllnot,” says Mrs. Lammle, with a certain 
hardened manner upon her, that makes Twemlow shrink, 
have surprised you so much as some others, after what 
passed between us at the house which is now turned out at 
windows. I have taken the liberty of calling upon you, 
to add a sort of postscript to what I said that day.” 


254 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Really,” says the uneasy little gentleman, “ really Mrs. 
Lammle, I should take it as a favor if you could excuse me 
from any further confidence.” 

“ My postscript — to retain the term I have used ” — says 
Mrs. Lammle, fixing her eyes on his face, to enforce what 
she says herself — “ coincides exactly with what you say, Mr. 
Twemlow. So far from troubling you with any new confi- 
dence, I merely wish to remind you what the old one was. 
I imparted to you a certain piece of knowledge, to be impart- 
ed again, as you thought best, to a certain person.” 

“ Which I did,” says Twemlow. 

‘‘ And for doing which, I thank you ; though, indeed, I 
scarcely know why I turned traitress to my husband in the 
matter, for the girl is a poor little fool. I was a poor little 
fool once myself ; I can find no better reason. Mr. Twem- 
low, if you should chance to see my husband, or to see me, or 
to see both of us, in the favor or confidence of any one else, 
you have no right to use against us the knowledge I intrust- 
ed you with, for one especial purpose which has been ac- 
complished. This is what I came to say. It is not a stip- 
ulation ; to a gentleman it is simply a reminder.” 

Twemlow makes her a little one-sided bow, as though say- 
ing, ‘‘Yes, I think you have a right to rely upon me,” and 
then she moistens her lips, and shows a sense of relief. 

“ Stay ! ” says Twemlow, rising as she rises. “ Pardon 
me a moment. I should never have sought you out, madam, 
to say what I am going to say, but since you have sought me 
out and are here, I will throw it off my mind. W as it quite 
consistent, in candor, with our taking that resolution against 
Mr. Fledgeby, that you should afterwards address Mr. 
Fledgeby as your dear and confidential friend, and entreat a 
favor of Mr. Fledgeby ? Always supposing that you did ; I 
assert no knowledge of my own on the subject ; it has been 
represented to me that you did.” 

“ Then he told you ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ It is strange that he should have told you the truth,” 
says Mrs. Lammle, seriously pondering. “ Pray where did 
a circumstance so very extraordinary happen ? ” 

Twemlow hesitates. “ I encountered Mr. Fledgeby, 
quite by accident, at Mr. Riah’s in Saint Mary Axe.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


255 


“Have you the misfortune to be in Mr. Riah’s hands, 
then ? ” 

“Unfortunately, madam,” returns Twemlow, “the one 
money-obligation to which I stand committed, the one debt 
of my life (but it is a just debt ; pray observe that I don’t dis- 
pute it), has fallen into Mr. Riah’s hands.” 

“ Mr. Twemlow,” says Mrs. Lammle, fixing his eyes with 
hers : “ it has fallen into Mr. Fledgeby ’s hands. Mr. Riah is 
his mask. It has fallen into Mr. Fledgeby’s hands. Let me 
tell you that, for your guidance. The information may be of 
use to you, if only to prevent your credulity, in judging an- 
other man’s truthfulness by your own, from being imposed 
upon.” 

“ Impossible ! How do you know it ? ” 

“ I scarcely know how I know it. The whole train of cir- 
cumstances seemed to take fire at once, and show it to me.” 

As she moves towards the door, Mr. Twemlow, attending 
on her, expresses his soothing hope that the condition of Mr. 
Lammle’s affairs is not irretrievable. 

“ I don’t know,” Mrs. Lammle answers, stopping, and 
sketching out the pattern of paper on the wall with the point 
of her parasol; “it depends. There may be an opening 
for him dawning now, or there may be none. W e shall soon 
find out. If none, we are bankrupt here, and must go 
abroad, I suppose.” 

The wondering Yeneering dinner is in full progress when 
the Analytical, perusing a scrap of paper lying on the salver, 
with the air of a literary Censor, adjusts it, takes his time 
about going to the table with it, and presents it to Mr. Eu- 
gene Wray burn. Whereupon the pleasant Tippins says 
aloud, “ The Lord Chancellor has resigned ! ” 

With distracting coolness and slowness — for he knows 
the curiosity of the Charmer to be always devouring — Eu- 
gene makes a pretense of getting out an eyeglass, polishing 
it, and reading the paper with difficulty, long after he has 
seen what is written on it. What is written on it is : 

“Young Blight.” 

“Waiting?” says Eugene over his shoulder, in confi- 
dence, with the Analytical. 

“ Waiting,” returns the Analytical in responsive confi- 
dence. 


256 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Eugene looks “Excuse me,” towards Mrs. Yeneering, 
goes out, and finds Young Blight, Mortimer’s clerk, at the 
hall-door. 

“ You told me to bring him, sir, to wherever you was, if he 
come while you was out and I was in,” sa3"s that discreet 
young gentleman, standing on tiptoe to whisper ; “ and I’ve 
brought him.” 

“ Sharp boy. Where is he ? ” asks Eugene. 

“ He’s in a cab, sir, at the door. I thought it best not to 
show him, you see, if it could be helped ; for he’s a-shaking 
all over, like — ” Blight’s simile is perhaps inspired by the 
surrounding dishes of sweets — “ like Glue Monge.” 

“ Sharp boy again,” returns Eugene. “ I’ll go to him.” 

Goes out straightway, and, leisurely leaning his arms on 
the open window of a cab in waiting, looks in at Mr. Dolls : 
who has brought his own atmosphere with him, and would 
seem from its odor to have brought it, for convenience of 
carriage, in a rum-cask. 

“ Now Dolls, wake up ! ” 

“ Mist Wray burn ? Drection ! Fifteen shillings ! ” 

After carefully reading the dingy scrap of paper handed 
to him, and as carefully tucking it into his waistcoat pocket, 
Eugene tells out the money ; beginning incautiously by tell- 
ing the first shilling into Mr. Dolls’s hand, which instantly 
jerks it out of window ; and ending by telling the fifteen shil- 
lings on the seat. 

Returning to the dining-room, and pausing for an instant 
behind the screen at the door, Eugene overhears, above the 
hum and clatter, the fair Tippins saying : “lam dying to ask 
him what he was called out for 1 ” 

“ Are you ? ” mutters Eugene, “ then perhaps if you can’t 
ask him, you’ll die. So I’ll be a benefactor to society, and 

go.” 


CHAPTER XLIV. 

P LASH WATER Weir-Mill Lock looked tranquil and 
pretty on an evening in the summer time ; but not par- 
ticularly so to Mr. Riderhood, who sat on one of the blunt 
wooden levers of his lock-gates, dozing. At the )ry of 


CUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


257 


Lock, ho ! Lock ! ” he gave his growl a responsive twist at 
the end, and turned his face down-stream to see who hailed. 

It was an amateur sculler, well up to his work though tak- 
ing it easily, in so light a boat that the Rogue remarked : 
“A little less on you, and you’d a’most ha’ been a Wager- 
but ; ” then went to work at his windlass handles and sluices, 
to let the sculler in. As the latter stood in his boat, holding 
on by the boat-hook to the woodwork at the lock side, wait- 
ing for the gates to open. Rogue Riderhood recognized his 
‘‘T’other governor,” Mr. Eugene Wrayburn; who was, 
however, too indifferent or too much engaged to recognize 
him. 

The creaking lock-gates opened slowly, and the light boat 
passed in as soon as there was room enough, and the creak- 
ing lock-gates closed upon it, and it floated low down in the 
dock between the two sets of gates, until the water should 
rise and the second gates should open and let it out. When 
Riderhood had run to his second windlass and turned it, and 
while he leaned against the lever of that gate to help it to 
swing open presently, he noticed, lying to rest under the 
hedge by the towing-path astern of the lock, a bargeman. 

The water rose and rose as the sluice poured in, dispersing 
the scum which had formed behind the lumbering gates, and 
sending the boat up, so that the sculler gradually rose like an 
apparition against the light from the bargeman’s point of 
view. Riderhood observed that the bargeman rose too, 
leaning on his arm, and seemed to have his eyes fastened on 
the rising figure. 

But there was the toll to be taken, as the gates were now 
complaining and opening. The T’other governor tossed it 
ashore, twisted in a piece of paper, and as he did so, knew his 
man. 

“ Ay, ay ? It’s you, is it, honest friend ? ” said Eugene, 
resuming his sculls. “ You got the place, then ? ” 

“ I got the place, and no thanks to you for it, nor yet none 
to Lawyer Lightwood.” 

“W"e saved our recommendation, honest fellow^,” said 
Eugene, “ for the next candidate — the one who will offer 
himself when you are transported or hanged. Don’ t be long 
about it; will you be so good ? ” 

17 


258 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


So imperturbable was the air with which he gravely bent 
to his work that Riderhood remained staring at him, without 
a retort. Having got his gates shut, he crossed back by his 
plank lock-bridge tc the towing-patli side of the river. 

If, in so doing, he took another glance at the bargeman, he 
did it by stealth. He cast himself on the grass by the Lock 
side, in an indolent way, with his back in that direction. 
The dip of Eugene Wray burn’s sculls had become hardly au- 
dible in his ears when the bargeman passed him, putting the 
utmost width that he could between them, and keeping un- 
der the hedge. Then Riderhood sat up and took a long look 
at his figure, and then cried : “ Hi — i — i ! Lock, ho 1 Lock ! 
Plashwater Weir Mill Lock! ” 

The bargeman stopped, and looked back. 

‘‘ Plashwater Weir Mill Lock, T’otherest gov — er — nor — 
or — or — or! ” cried Mr. Riderhood, with his han^s to his 
mouth. 

The bargeman turned back. Approaching nearer and 
nearer, the bargeman became Bradley Headstone, in rough 
water-side second-hand clothing. 

“ Wish I may die,” said Riderhood, smiting his right leg, 
and laughing, as he. sat on the grass, “ if you ain’t ha’ been a 
imitating me, T’otherest governor ! Never thought myself 
so good-looking afore ! ” 

Truly, Bradley Headstone had taken careful note of the 
honest man’s dress in the course of that night-walk they had 
had together. He must have committed it to memory, and 
slowly got it by heart. It was exactly reproduced in the 
dress he now wore. 

TMs your Lock?” said Bradley, whose surprise had a 
genuine air : they told me, where I last inquired, it was the 
third I should come to. This is only the second.” 

“It’s my belief, governor,” returned Riderhood, with a 
wink and shake of his head, “ that you’ve dropped one in 
your counting. It ain’t Locks as you'ye been giving your 
mind to. No, no!” 

“ What other calculations do you suppose I have been oc- 
cupied with ? Mathematics ? ” 

“I never heerd it called that. It’s a long word for it 
Hows’ever, p’raps you call it so.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


259 


“It. What?” 

“I’il say them, instead of it, if you like,” was the coolly 
growled reply. “ It’s safer talk too.” 

“ What do you mean that I should understand by them ? ” 

“ Spites, afironts, offenses, giv’ and took, deadly aggrawa- 
tions, suchlike,” answered Riderhood. 

“ You think I have been following him ? ” said Bradley. 

“ I KNOW you have,” said Riderhood. 

“Well! I have, I have,” Bradley admitted. “But,” with 
another anxious look up the river, “ he may land.” 

“ Easy you ! He won’t be lost if he does land,” said Ri- 
derhood. “ He must leave his boat behind him.” 

“ He was speaking to you, just now,” said Bradley, kneel- 
ing on one knee on the grass. “ What did he say ? ” 

“ Cheek,” said Riderhood. 

“ What?” 

“Cheek,” repeated Riderhood, with an angry oath; 

“ cheek is what he said. He can’t say nothing but cheek. 
I’d ha’ liked to plump down aboard of him, neck and crop, 
with a heavy jump, and sunk him.” 

Bradley turned away his haggard face for a few moments, 
and then said, tearing up a tuft of grass : 

“ Damn him I ” 

“ Hooroar 1” cried Riderhood. “ Does you credit I Then 
I make out, T’otherest, as he is a-going to her ? ” 

“ He left London, yesterday. I have hardly a doubt, this 
time, that at last he is going to her.” 

“ You ain’t sure, then ? ” 

“I am as sure here,” said Bradley, with a clutch at the 
breast of his coarse shirt, “ as if it was written there ; ” with 
a blow or a stab at the sky. 

“ Ah I But judging from the looks on you,” retorted Ri- ’ 
derhood, “ you’ve made ekally sure afore, and have got dis- 
apinted. It has told upon you.” 

“ Listen,” said Bradley, in a low voice, bending forward to 
lay his hand upon the lock-keeper’s shoulder. “ These are 
my holidays.” 

“Are they, by George! ” muttered Riderhood, with his 
eyes on the passion-wasted face. “Your working days 
must be stiff ’uns, if these is your holidays.” 


260 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


And I have never left him,” pursued Bradley, waving 
the interruption aside with an impatient hand, since they 
began. And I never will leave him now, till I have seen him 
with her.” 

And when you have seen him with her ? ” 

“ — I’ll come back to you.” 

Riderhood stiffened the knee on which he had been rest- 
ing, got up, and looked gloomily at his new friend. After a 
few moments they walked side by side in the direction the 
boat had taken, as if by tacit consent ; Bradley pressing for- 
ward, and Riderhood holding back. 

“ I have a pound for you,” said Bradley. 

You’ve tAvo,” said Riderhood. 

Bradley held a sovereign between his fingers. Riderhood 
held his left hand open. Bradley dipped in his purse for 
another sovereign, and two chinked in Riderhood’s hand. 

Now, I must follow him,” said Bradley Headstone. 

Turning back towards his lock, the Rogue pondered as 
deeply as it was within the contracted power of such a fel- 
low to do. “ Why did he copy my clothes ? He could have 
looked like what he wanted to look like, without that.” 
W as it done by accident ? The setting of a trap for finding 
out whether it was accidentally done, soon superseded, as a 
practical piece of cunning, the abstruser inquiry why other- 
wise it was done. And he devised a means. 

Rogue Riderliood took off the rusty colorless wisp that he 
wore round his throat, and substituted a red neckerchief, 
leaving the long ends floAving. “ Noav,” said the Rogue, “ if 
arter he sees me in this neckhankecher, I see him in a sim’lar 
neckhankecher, it Avon’t be accident ! ” 

“ Lock ho ! Lock ! ” It was a light night, and a barge 
coming down summoned him out of a long doze. In due 
course he had let the barge through and was alone again, 
looking to the closing of his gates, when Bradley Headstone 
appeared before him, standing on the brink of the lock. 

“Halloa!” said Riderhood. “Back a’ ready, T’other- 
est ? ” 

“He has put up for the night, at an Angler’s Inn,” was 
the fatigued and hoarse reply. “ He goes on, up the river, 
at six in the morning. I haA^e come back for a co'iple of 
hours’ rest.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


261 


You want ’em,” said Riderliood. 
don’t want them,” returned Bradley, irritably, “be- 
cause I would rather not have them, but would much prefer 
to follow him all night.” 

“ But hadn’t you better come in and take your couple o’ 
hours’ rest ? ” 

“ Thank you. Yes.” 

He followed Biderhood into the lock-house, where the 
latter produced from a cupboard some cold salt beef and 
half a loaf, some gin in a bottle, and some water in a jug. 
The last he brought in, cool and dripping, from the river. 

“ There, T’otherest,” said Biderhood, stooping over him 
to put it on the table. “ You’d better take a bite and a sup, 
afore you take your snooze.” The draggling ends of the red 
neckerchief caught the schoolmaster’s eye. Biderhood saw 
him look at it. 

“ Oh ! ” thought that worthy. “ You’re a-taking notice, 
are you ? Come ! You shall have a good squint at it then.” 
With which reflection he sat down on the other side of the 
table, threw open his vest, and made a pretense of re-tying 
the neckerchief with much deliberation. 

Bradley ate and drank, and soon afterwards, divesting 
himself only of his shoes and coat, laid himself down. 

Biderhood, leaning back in his wooden arm-chair with his 
arms folded on his breast, looked at him lying with his right 
hand clenched in his sleep and his teeth set, until a film came 
over his own sight, and he slept too. He awoke to find that 
it was daylight, and that his visitor was already astir, and 
going out to the river-side to cool his head : — “ Though I’m 
blessed,” muttered Biderhood at the lock-house door, look- 
ing after him, “ if I think there’s water enough in all the 
Thames to do that for you ! ” Within five minutes he had 
taken his departure, and was passing on into the calm dis- 
tance as he had passed yesterday. Biderhood knew when a 
fish leaped, by his starting and glancing round. 

“ Lock ho ! Lock ! ” at intervals all day, and “ Lock ho I 
Lock ! ” thrice in the ensuing night, but no return of Brad- 
ley. The second day was sultry and oppressive. In the aft- 
ernoon a thunderstorm came up, and had but newly bro- 
ken into a furious sweep of rain when he rusltpd in at the 
door, like the storm itself. 


262 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ You’ve seen him ^vithher ! ” exclaimed Riderhood. 

‘‘ I have.” 

“ Where ? ” 

“At his journey’s end. His boat’s hauled up for three 
days. I heard him give the order. Then, I saw him wait 
for her and meet her. I saw them — ” he stopped as though 
he were suffocating, and began again — “ I saw them walk- 
ing side by side, last night.” 

“ What did you do ? ” 

“ Nothing.” 

“ What are you going to do ? ” 

He dropped into a chair, and laughed. Immediately aft- 
erwards, a great spirt of blood burst from his nose. 

“ How does that happen ? ” asked Riderhood. 

“ I don’t know. I can’t keep it back. It has happened 
twice — three times — four times — I don’t know how many 
times — since last night. I taste it, smell it, see it, it chokes 
me, and then it breaks out like this.” 

He went into the pelting rain again with his head bare, 
and bending low over the river, and scooping up the water 
with his two hands, washed the blood away. All beyond 
his figure, as Riderhood looked from the door, was a vast 
dark curtain in solemn movement towards one quarter of 
the heavens. He raised his head and came back, wet from 
head to foot, but with the lower part of his sleeves, where he 
had dipped into the river, streaming water. 

“ Your face is like a ghost’s,” said Riderhood. 

“ Did you ever see a ghost? ” was the .sullen retort. 

“ I mean to say you are quite wore out.” 

“ That may well be. I have had no rest since I left here. 
I don’t remember that I have so much as sat down since I 
left here.” 

“ Lie down now, then,” said Riderhood. 

“ I will, if you will give me something to quench my 
thirst.” 

The bottle and jug were again produced, and he mixed a 
weak draught, and another, and drank both in quick succes- 
sion. “You asked me something,” he said then. 

“No, I didn’t,” replied Riderhood. 

“ I tell you,” retorted Bradley, turning upon him in a wild 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


263 


and desperate manner, “ you asked me something, before I 
went out to wash my face in the river.” 

“ Oh ! Then ? ” said Eiderhood, backing a little. “ I ask- 
ed you wot you wos a-going to do.” 

“ How can a man in this state know ? ” he answered, pro- 
testing with both his tremulous hands, with an action so vig- 
orously angry that he shook the water from his sleeves up- 
on the floor, as if he had wrung them. How can I plan 
anything if I haven’t sleep ? ” 

“ Why, that’s what I as good as said,” returned the other. 
“ Didn’t I say lie down ? ” 

Well, perhaps you did.” 

“Well! Anyways I says it again. Sleep where you 
slept last; the sounder and longer you can sleep, the better 
you’ll know arterwards what you’re up to.” 

His pointing to the truckle bed in the corner seemed 
gradually to bring that poor couch to Bradley’s wandering 
remembrance. He slipped off his worn down-trodden 
shoes, and cast himself heavily upon the bed. 

Eiderhood sat down in his wooden arm-chair, and looked 
through the window at the lightning, and listened to the 
thunder. But his thoughts were far from being absorbed by 
the thunder and the lightning, for again and again and again 
he looked very curiously at the exhausted man upon the bed. 
The man had turned up the collar of the rough coat he wore, 
to shelter himself from the storm, and had buttoned it about 
his neck. Unconscious of that, and of most things, he had 
left the coat so, both when he had laved his face in the river, 
and when he had cast himself upon the bed ; though it would 
have been much easier to him if he had unloosened it. 

“ He sleeps sound,” said Eiderhood, “ yet he’s that up to 
me and that noticing of me that my getting out of my chair 
may wake him, when a rattling peal won’t; let alone my 
touching of him.” 

He very cautiously rose to his feet. “ T’otherest,” he 
said, in a low, calm voice, “ are you a-lying easy ? There’s 
a chill in the air, governor. Shall I put a coat over you ? ” 

The sleeper moving an arm, be sat down again in his chair, 
and feigned to watch the storm from the window. 

It was at the concealed throat of the sleeper that Eider- 


264 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


hood so often looked so euriously, until the sleep seemed to 
deepen into the stupor of the dead-tired in mind and body. 
Then Riderhood came from the window cautiously, and 
stood by the bed. 

‘‘ Poor man ! ” he murmured in alow tone, with a crafty 
face, and a very watchful eye and ready foot, lest he should 
start up ; this here coat of his must make him uneasy in his 
sleep. Shall I loosen it for him, and make him more com- 
fortable ? I think I ought to it, poor man. I think I will.” 

He touched the first button with a very cautious hand, 
and a step backward. But, the sleeper remaining in pro- 
found unconsciousness, he touched the other buttons with a 
more assured hand, and perhaps the more lightly on that ac- 
count. Softly and slowly, he opened the coat and drew it 
back. 

The draggling ends of a bright-red neckerchief were then 
disclosed, and he had even been at the pains of dipping 
parts of it in some liquid, to give it the appearance of having 
become stained by wear. With a much-perplexed face, 
Riderhood looked from it to the sleeper, and from the 
sleeper to it, and finally crept back to his chair, and there, 
with his hand to his chin, sat long in a brown study, looking 
at both. 


CHAPTER XLY. 



IST one of the reading evenings at the Bower, Mr. Boffin 


kissed Mrs. Boffin after a five o’clock dinner, and trot- 
ted out, nursing his big stick in both arms, so that, as of old, 
it seemed to be whispering in his ear. 

Mr. Boffin and his stick went on alone together, until they 
arrived at certain cross-ways where they would be likely to 
fall in with any one coming, at about the same time, from 
Clerkenwell to the Bower. Here they stopped, and Mr. 
Boffin consulted his watch. 

“It wants five minutes, good, to Yenus’s appointment,” 
said he. “I’m rather early. ’ ’ 

But Yenus was a punctu^^l man, and, even as Mr. Boffin 
replaced his watch in his pocket, was to be descried coming 
towards him. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


265 


“ Thank’ee, Venus,” vsaid Mr. Boffin. Thank’ee, thank- 
’ee, thank’ee ! Now that you’ve been to see me, and have 
consented to keep up the appearance before Wegg of re- 
maining in it for a time, I have got a sort of a backer. Do 
you think W egg is likely to drop down upon me to-night, 
Venus? ” 

I think he is, sir.” 

They rang at the Bower gate. The stumping approach of 
Wegg was soon heard behind it, and as it turned upon its 
hinges he became visible. 

Mr. Boffin, sir ? You’re quite a stranger ! ” 

“ Yes. I’ve been otherwise occupied, Wegg.” 

“ Have you indeed, sir ? ” returned the literary gentleman, 
with a threatening sneer. “Hah! I’ve been looking for 
you, sir, rather what I may call specially.” 

“ You don’t say so, Wegg ? ” 

“ Yes, I do say so, sir. And if you hadn’t come round to 
me to-night, dash my wig if I wouldn’t have come round to 
you to-morrow. Now ! I tell you I ” 

“ Nothing wrong, I hope, Wegg ? ” 

“ Oh no, Mr. Boffin,” was the ironical answer. “ Nothing 
wrong ! What should be wrong in Boffinses Bower ! Step 
in, sir. 

‘ If you’ll come to the Bower I’ve shaded for you, 

Your bed shan’t be roses all spangled with doo: 

Will you, will you, will you, will you, come to the Bower ? 

Oh, won’t you, won’t you, won’t you, won’t you, come to the Bower ? ’ ” 


An unholy glare of contradiction and offense shone in the 
eyes of Mr. W egg, as he turned the key on his patron, after 
ushering him into the yard with this vocal quotation. Mr. 
Boffin’s air was crestfallen and submissive. Whispered 
Wegg to Venus, as they crossed the yard behind him: 
“ Look at the worm and minion ; he’s down in the mouth al- 
ready.” Whispered Venus to Wegg ; “ That’s because I’ve 
told him. I’ve prepared the way for you.” 

Mr. Boffin, entering the usual chamber, laid his stick upon 
the settle usually reserved for him, thrust his hands into his 
pockets, and, with his shoulders raised and his hat drooping 
back upon them, looked disconsolately at Wegg. “My 


266 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


friend and partner, Mr. Yenus, gives me to understand,” re- 
marked that man of might, addressing him, “ that you are 
aware of our power over you. Now, when you have took 
your hat ofi‘, we’ll go into that pint.” 

Mr. Boffin shook it off with one shake, so that it dropped 
on the floor behind him, and remained in his former attitude 
with his former rueful look upon him. 

‘‘ First of all, I’m a-going to call you Boffin, for short. 
If you don’t like it, it’s open to you to lump it.” 

‘‘ I don’t mind it, Wegg,” Mr. Boffin replied. 

“ That’s lucky for you, Boffin. Now, do you want to be 
read to ? ” 

‘‘ I don’t particularly care about it to-night, Wegg.” 

“Because if you did want to,” pursued Mr. Wegg, the 
brilliancy of whose point was dimmed by his having been 
unexpectedly answered : “ you wouldn't be. I’ve be'en 
your slave long enough. I’m not to be trampled underfoot 
by a dustman any more. With the single exception of the 
salary, I renounce the whole and total sitiwation.” 

“ Since you say it is to be so, Wegg,” returned Mr. Boffin, 
with folded hands, “ I suppose it must be.” 

“ /suppose it must be,” Wegg retorted. “ Next (to clear 
the ground before coming to business), you’ve placed in this 
yard a skulking, a sneaking, and a sniffing menial.” 

“ He hadn’t a cold in his head when I sent him here,” said 
Mr. Boffin. 

“Boffin! ” retorted Wegg, “I w^arn you not to attempt 
a joke with me ! Any how, and every how, he has been 
planted here, and he is here. Now, I won’t have him here. 
So I call upon Boffin, before I say another word, to fetch him 
in and send him packing to the right-about.” 

The unsuspecting Sloppy was at that moment airing his 
many buttons within view of the window. Mr. Boffin 
opened the Tvindow and beckoned him to come in. 

“ I call upon Boffin,” said Wegg, “ to inform that menial 
that I am master here I ” 

In humble obedience, wdien the button-gleaming Sloppy 
entered, Mr. Boffin said to him : “ Sloppy, my fine fellow, 
Mr. W egg is master here. He doesn’t w^ant you, and you are 
to go from here,” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


267 


For good ! ” Mr. Wegg severely stipulated. 

“ For good,” said Mr. Boffin. 

Sloppy stared, with both his eyes and all his buttons, and 
his mouth wide open ; but was without loss of time escorted 
forth by Silas Wegg, pushed out at the yard gate by the 
shoulders, and locked out. 

‘•The atomspear,” said Wegg, stumping back into the 
room again, a little reddened by his late exertion, “is now 
freer for the purposes of respiration. Mr. Venus, sir, take a 
chair. Boffin, you may sit down.” 

I never meant, my dear Wegg — ” Mr. Boffin was begin- 
ning, when Silas stopped him. 

“ Hold your tongue. Boffin ! Answer when you’re called 
upon to answer. You’ll find you’ve got quite enough to do. 
How you’re aware — are you — that you’re in possession of 
property to which you’ve no right at all ? ” 

“ Venus tells me so,” said Mr. Boffin. 

“/tell you so,” returned Silas. “How, here’s my hat. 
Boffin, and here’s my walking-stick. Trifle with me, and 
instead of making a bargain Avith you. I’ll put on my hat and 
take up my Avalking-stick and go out, and make a bargain 
with the rightful OAvner. Hoav, Avhat do you say ? ” 

“ I say,” returned Mr. Boffin, leaning forward in alarmed 
appeal, Avith his hands on his knees, “ that I am sure I don’t 
want to trifle, W egg. I have said so to V enus.” 

“ You certainly have, sir,” said Venus. 

“ Then at once you confess yourself desirous to come to 
terms, do you. Boffin ? ” 

“ I am willing, Wegg, to come to terms.” 

“ Willing AA^on’t do. Boffin. I won’t take willing. Are 
you desirous to come to terms ? ” 

“Yes. I ask to be alloAved to come to terms, supposing 
your document is all correct.” 

“ Don’t you be afraid of that,’* said Silas, poking his head 
at him. “You shall be satisfied by seeing it. Mr. Venus 
Avill shoAv it you, and I’ll hold you the Avhile. Then you 
Avant to knoAV Avhat the terms are. How mark. Boffin, 
mark ’em well, because they’re the loAvest terms and the on- 
ly terms. You’ll throAv your Mound (the little Mound as 
comes to you any Avay) into the general estate, and then 


268 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


you’ll divide the whole property into three parts, and you’ll 
keep one and hand over the others.” 

Mr. Venus’s mouth screwed itself up, as Mr. Boffin’s face 
lengthened itself ; Mr. V enus not having been prepared for 
such a rapacious demand. 

“JSTow, wait a bit, Boffin,” Wegg proceeded, “there’s 
something more. You’ve been a-squan dering this property 
— laying some of it out on yourself. That won’t do. Y ou’ve 
bought a house. You’ll be charged for it.” 

“ I shall be ruined, Wegg ! ” Mr. Boffin faintly protested. 

“ Now wait a bit. Boffin ; there’s something more. Y ou’ll 
leave me in sole custody of these Mounds till they’re all laid 
low. If any waluables should be found in ’em, I’ll take care 
of such waluables. You’ll produce your contract for the 
sale of the Mounds, that we may know to a penny what 
they’re worth, and you’ll make out likewise an exact list 'of 
all the other property. When the Mounds is cleared away 
to the last shovel-full, the final diwision will come off.” 

“ Dreadful, dreadful ! I shall die in a work-house ! ” cried 
the Grolden Dustman, wfith his hands to his head. 

“Now, w^ait a bit, Boffin; there’s something more. 
You’ve been unlawfully ferreting about this yard. You’ve 
been seen in the act of ferreting about this yard. Two pair 
of eyes at the present moment brought to bear upon you, 
have seen you dig up a Dutch bottle.” 

“ It was mine, Wegg,” protested Mr. Boffin. “ I put it 
there myself.” 

“ What was in it. Boffin ? ” inquired Silas. 

“ Not gold, not silver, not bank notes, not jewels, nothing 
that you could turn into money, W egg ; upon my soul ! ” 

“ Prepared, Mr, Venus,” said Wegg, turning to his partner 
wdth a knowing and superior air, “ for an ewasive answer on 
the part of our dusty friend here, I have hit out a little idea 
which I think will meet your views. W e charge that bottle 
against our dusty friend at a thousand pounds.” 

Mr. Boffin drew a deep groan. 

“Now, wait a bit. Boffin; there’s something more. In 
your employment is an underhanded sneak, named Boke- 
smith. It won’t answer to have him about, while this busi- 
ness of ours is about. He must be discharged.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, 


269 


‘‘Rokesmith is already discharged,” said Mr. Boffin, 
speaking in a muffled voice, with his hands before his face, 
as he rocked himself on the settle. 

‘‘ Already discharged, is he ? ” returned Wegg, surprised. 
“ Then, Boffin, I believe there’s nothing more at present.” 

The unlucky gentleman continuing to rock himself to and 
fro, and to utter an occasional moan, Mr. Venus besought 
him to bear up against his reverses, and to take time to ac- 
custom himself to the thought of his new position. 

At length, Mr. Boffin entreated to be allowed a quarter of 
an hour’s grace, and a cooling walk of that duration in the 
yard. With some difficulty Mr. Wegg granted this great 
favor, but only on condition that he accompanied Mr. Boffin 
in his walk, as not knowing what he might fraudulently un- 
earth if he were left to himself. 

“I can’t help myself ! ” cried Mr. Boffin, flouncing on the 
settle in a forlorn manner, with his hands deep in his pock- 
ets, as if his pockets had sunk. What’s the good of my 
pretending to stand out, when I can’t help myself ? I must 
give in to the terms. But I should like to see the document.” 

Wegg, who was all for clinching the nail he had so strong- 
ly driven home, announced that Boffin should see it without 
an hour’s delay, and they set out for Mr. Venus’s establish- 
ment. 

When all was snug, and the shop-door fastened, Mr. Ve- 
nus said : “ I suppose, Mr. Wegg, we may now produce the 
paper? ” 

“ Now, Mr. Venus,” said Silas, taking off his coat, “ when 
I catches our friend here round the arms and body, and pins 
him tight to the back of the chair, you may show him what 
he wants to see. If you’ll open it and hold it well up^in one 
hand, sir, and a candle in the other, he can read it charming.” 

Mr. Boffin seemed rather inclined to object to these pre- 
cautionary arrangements, but, being immediately embraced 
by W egg, resigned himself. V enus then produced the doc- 
ument, and Mr. Boffin slowly spelled it out aloud : so very 
slowly, that Wegg, who was holding him in the chair with 
the grip of a wrestler, became exceedingly the worse for his 
exertions. “ Say when you’ve put it safe back, Mr. Venus,” 
he uttered with difficulty, “ for the strain of this is terrimen- 
jious.” 


270 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


At length the document was restored to its place. 

“ Well, Boffin ! ” said Wegg, as soon as he was in a condi- 
tion to speak. ‘‘ Now, you know.” 

“ Yes, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin, meekly. “ Now, I know.” 

“ You have no doubts about it. Boffin. ” 

‘‘No, Wegg. None,” was the slow and sad reply. 

“ Then, take care, you,” said- Wegg, “ that you stick to 
your conditions. I haven’t mentioned one thing, because it’s 
a detail that comes of course. You must be followed up, you 
know. You must be kept under inspection.” 

“ I don’t quite understand,” said Mr. Boffin. 

“ Don’t you ? ” sneered Wegg. “ Where’s your wdts, Bof- 
fin ? Till the Mounds is down and this business completed, 
you’re accountable for all the property, recollect. Consider 
yourself accountable to me. Mr. V enus here being too milk- 
and-watery with you, I am the boy for you.” 

“ I’ve been a-thinking,” said Mr. Boffin, in a tone of de- 
spondency, “ that I must keep the knowledge from my old 
lady.” 

“ The knowledge of the diwision, d’ye mean ? ” 

“ Yes. If she was to die first of us two she might then 
think all her life, poor thing, that I had got the rest of the 
fortune still, and was saving it.” 

“ Well,” said Wegg, contemptuously, “ keep it from your 
old lady, /ain’t going to tell her. I can liave you under 
close inspection without that. I’m as good a man as you, 
and better. Ask me to dinner. Grive me the run of your 
’ouse. I was good enough for you and your old lady once, 
when I helped you out with your weal and hammers. Was 
there no Miss Elizabeth, Master George, Aunt Jane, and 
Uncle Parker, before you two ? ” 

“ Gently, Mr. Wegg, gently,” Venus urged. 

“ Milk-and-water-erily you mean, sir. I’ve got him under 
inspection, and I’ll inspect him. 

‘Along the line the signal ran 
England expects as this present man *' 

Will keep Boffin to his duty.' 

— Boffin, I’ll see you home.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


271 


CHAPTER XLYI. 



HERUBIC Pa arose with as little noise as possible from 


beside majestic Ma, one morning early, having a holi- 
day before him. Pa and the lovely woman had a rather par- 
ticular appointment to keep. 

Yet Pa and the lovely woman were not going out togeth- 
er. Bella was up before four, but had no bonnet on. She 
was waiting at the foot of the stairs — was sitting on the bot- 
tom stair, in fact — to receive Pa when he came down, but 
her only object seemed to be to get Pa well out of the house. 

Bella then, returning to the bedroom where Lavvy the Ir- 
repressible still slumbered, put on a little bonnet of quiet, but 
on the whole of sly appearance, which she had yesterday 
made. “ I am going for a walk, Lavvy,” she said, as she 
stooped down and kissed her. The Irrepressible, with a 
bounce in the bed, and a remark that it wasn’t time to get up 
yet, relapsed into unconsciousness, if she had come out of it. 

Behold Bella tripping along the streets, the dearest girl 
afoot under the summer sun ! Behold Pa waiting for Bella 
behind a pump. Behold Bella and Pa aboard an early 
steamboat bound for Greenwich. 

W ere they expected at Greenwich ? Probably. At least, 
Mr. John Rokesmith was on the pier looking out, about a 
couple of hours before the coaly (but to him gold-dusty) lit- 
tle steamboat got her steam up in London. Probably. At 
least, Mr. John Rokesmith seemed perfectly satisfied when 
he descried them on board. Probably. At least, Bella no 
sooner stepped ashore than she took Mr. John Rokesmith’s 
arm, without evincing surprise, and the two w^alked away 
together with an ethereal air of happiness which, as it were, 
wafted up from the earth and drew after them a gruff and 
glum old pensioner to see it out. Two wooden legs had this 
gruff and glum old pensioner, and, a minute before Bella 
stepped out of the boat, and drew that confiding little arm of 
hers through Rokesmith’s, he had had no object in life but 
tobacco, and not enough of that. Stranded was Gruff and 
Glum in a harbor of everlasting mud, when all in an instant 
Bella floated him, and away he went. 

Say, cherubic parent taking the lead, in what direction do 


272 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


we steer first? With some such inquiry in his thoughts, 
Gruff and Glum, stricken by so sudden an interest that he 
perked his neck and looked over the intervening people, as 
if he were trying to stand on tiptoe with his two wooden 
legs, took an observation of R. W. There was no “ first ” in 
the case, Gruff and Glum made out; the cherubic parent 
was bearing down and crowding on direct for Greenwich 
church, to see his relations. Be it as it might, he gave his 
moorings the slip, and followed in chase. 

The cherub went before, all beaming smiles : Bella and 
J ohn Rokesmith followed ; Gruff and Glum stuck to them 
hke wax. 

Who taketh ? I, John, and so do I, Bella. Who giveth ? 
I, R. W. Forasmuch, Gruff and Glum, as John and Bella 
have consented together in holy wedlock, you may (in short) 
consider it done, and withdraw your two wooden legs from 
this temple. To the foregoing purport, the Minister speaking 
as directed by the Rubric, to the People, selectly represent- 
ed in the present instance by G. and G. above mentioned. 

And now, the church-porch having swallowed up Bella 
Wilfer for ever and ever, had it not in its power to relinquish 
that young woman, but slid into the happy sunlight, Mrs.. 
John Rokesmith instead. And long on the bright steps 
stood Gruff and Glum, looking after the pretty bride, with a 
narcotic consciousness of having dreamed a dream. 

After which, Bella took out from her pocket a little letter, 
and read it aloud to Pa and John ; this being a true copy of 
the same. 

“ Dearest Ma : 

“ I hope you won’t be angry, but I am most happily mar- 
ried to Mr. John Rokesmith, who loves me better than I can 
ever deserve, except by loving him with all my heart. I 
thought it best not to mention it beforehand, in case it 
should cause any little difference at home. Please tell dar- 
ling Pa. W ith love to Lavvy , 

“ Ever, dearest Ma, 

“ Your affectionate daughter, 

“ Bella 

“ (P.S.— Rokesmith).’* 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


273 


Then John Rokesmith put the queen’s countenance on 
the letter — when had Her Gracious Majesty looked so be- 
nign as on that blessed morning ! — and then Bella popped it 
into the post-office, and said merrily, “ How, dearest Pa, 
you are safe, and will never be taken ahve ! ” 

Pa was, at first, in the stirred depths of his conscience, so 
far from sure of being safe yet, that he made out majestic 
matrons lurking in ambush among the harmless trees of 
Greenwich Park, and seemed to see a stately countenance 
tied up in a well-known pocket-handkerchief glooming 
down at him from a window of the Observatory, where the 
Familiars of the Astronomer Royal nightly out watch the 
winking Stars. But, the minutes passing on and no Mrs. 
Wilfer in the flesh appearing, he became more confident, 
and so repaired with good heart and appetite to Mr. and 
Mrs. John Rokesmith’s modest little cottage on Blackheath, 
where breakfast was ready. 

Then they, all three, out for a charming ride, and for a 
charming stroll among heath in bloom, behold the identical 
Gruff and Glum with his wooden legs horizontally disposed 
before him, who said that if it warn’t a liberty he wished her 
ji and the fairest of fair wind and weather ; further, in a gen- 
eral way requesting to know what cheer ? and scrambling 
up on his two wooden legs to salute, hat in hand, ship-shape, 
with the gallantry of a man-of-warsman and a heart of oak. 

But the marriage dinner was the crowning success, for 
what had bride and bridegroom plotted to do, but to have 
and to hold that dinner in the very room of the very hotel 
where Pa and the lovely woman had once dined together ! 
Bella sat between Pa and John, and divided her attentions 
pretty equally, but felt it necessary (in the waiter’s absence) 
to remind Pa that she was his lovely woman no longer. 

“ I am well aware of it, my dear,” returned the cherub, 

and I resign you willingly.” 

‘‘ Willingly, sir ? You ought to be broken-hearted.” 

“ So I should be, my dear, if I thought that I was going to 
lose you.” 

“ But you know you are not ; don’t you, poor dear Pa ? 
You know that you have only made a new relation who will 
be as fond of you and as thankful to you — for my sake and 
your own sake both — as I am ; don’t you, dear little Pa ? ” 


274 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


CHAPTER XLVII. 

T he impressive gloom v^ith Avhich Mrs. Wilfer received 
her husband on his return from the wedding, knocked 
so hard at the door of the cherubic conscience, and likewise 
so impaired the firmness of the cherubic legs, that the cul- 
prit’s tottering condition of mind and body might have rous- 
ed suspicion in less occupied persons than the grimly heroic 
lady. Miss Lavinia, and that esteemed friend of the family, 
Mr. G-eorge Sampson. But, the attention of all three being 
fully possessed by the main fact of the marriage, they had 
happily none to bestow on the guilty conspirator ; to which 
fortunate circumstance he owed the escape for which he was 
in nowise indebted to himself. 

“You do not, R. W.,” said Mrs Wilfer from her stately 
corner, “ inquire for your daughter Bella.” 

“ To be sure, my dear,” he returned, with a most flagrant 
assumption of unconsciousness, “ I did omit it. How — or 
perhaps I should rather say where — is Bella ? ” 

“ Not here,” Mrs. Wilfer proclaimed, with folded arms. 
The cherub faintly muttered something to the abortive ef- 
fect of “ Oh, indeed, my dear ! ” 

“Not here,” repeated Mrs. Wilfer, in a stern sonorous 
voice. “ In a word, R. W., you have no daughter Bella.” 

“ No daughter Bella, my dear ? ” 

“No. Your daughter Bella,” said Mrs. Wilfer, with a 
lofty air of never having had the least copartnership in that 
young lady : of whom she now made reproachful mention as 
an article of luxury which her husband had set up entirely on 
his own account, and in direct opposition to her advice : 
“ your daughter Bella has bestowed herself upon a Mendi- 
cant.” 

“ Grood gracious, my dear ! ” 

“ Show your father his daughter Bella’s letter, Lavinia,” 
said Mrs. Wilfer, in her monotonous Act of Parliament tone, 
and waving her hand. “ I think your father will admit it to 
be documentary proof of what I tell him. I believe your 
father is acquainted with his daughter Bella’s writing. But 
I do not know. He may tell you he is not. Nothirg will 
surprise me.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


275 


“ Posted at Grreenwich, and dated this morning,” said the 
Irrepressible, flouncing at her father in handing him the evi- 
dence. “ Hopes Ma ’won’t be angry, but is happily married 
to Mr. John Rokesmith, and didn’t mention it beforehand to 
avoid words, and please tell darling you, and love to me, and 
I should like to know what you’d have said if any other un- 
married member of the family had done it ! ” 

He read the letter, and faintly exclaimed, “ Dear me ! ” 

‘‘You may well say Dear me ! ” rejoined Mrs. Wilfer, in a 
deep tone. Upon which encouragement he said it again, 
though scarcely with the success he had expected ; for the 
scornful lady then remarked, with extreme bitterness, 
“You said that before.” 

“It’s very surprising. But I suppose, my dear,” hinted 
the cherub, as he folded the letter after a disconcerting si- 
lence, “ that we must make the best of it ? Would you ob- 
ject to my pointing out, my dear, that Mr. John Rokesmith 
is not (so far as I am acquainted with him), strictly speaking, 
a Mendicant.” 

“ Indeed ? ” returned Mrs. Wilfer, with an awful air of po- 
liteness. “ Truly so ? I was not aware that Mr. J ohn Roke- 
smith was a gentleman of landed property. But I am much 
reheved to hear it.” 

“ I doubt if you have heard it, my dear,” the cherub sub- 
mitted with hesitation. 

“Thank you,” said Mrs. Wilfer. “I make false state- 
ments, it appears? So be it. If my daughter flies in my 
face, surely my husband may. The one thing is not more 
unnatural than the other. There seems a fitness in the ar- 
rangement. By all means ! ” Assuming, with a shiver of 
resignation, a deadly cheerfulness. 

But here the Irrepressible skirmished into the conflict, 
dragging the reluctant form of Mr. Sampson after her. 

“ Ma,” interposed the young lady, “ I must say I think it 
would be much better if you would keep to the point, and 
not hold forth about people’s flying into people’s faces, 
which is nothing more nor less than impossible nonsense.” 

“ How ! ” exclaimed Mrs. Wilfer, knitting her dark brows. 

“Just im-possible nonsense, Ma,” returned Lavvy,. “and 
George Sampson knows it is, as well as I do.” 


270 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Mrs. Wilfer, suddenly becoming petrified, fixed her indig- 
nant eyes upon the wretched G-eorge; who, divided be- 
tween the support due from him to his love, and the support 
due from him to his love’s mamma, supported nobody, not 
even himself. 

The true point is,” pursued Lavinia, “ that Bella has be- 
haved in a most unsisterly way to me, and might have se- 
verely compromised me with G-eorge and with George’s 
family, by making off and getting married in this very low 
and disreputable manner — with some pew-opener or other, 
I suppose, for a bridesmaid — when she ought to have confid- 
ed in me, and ought to have said, ‘ If, Lavvy, you consider it 
due to your engagement with George, that you should coun- 
tenance the occasion by being present, then Lavvy, I beg 
you to be present, keeping my secret from Ma and Pa.’ As 
of course I should have done.” 

“ As of course you would have done ? Ingrate ! ” ex- 
claimed Mrs. Wilfer. “ Viper ! ” 

“I say! You know, ma’am. Upon my honor, you 
mustn’t,” Mr. Sampson remonstrated, shaking his head seri- 
ously. With the highest respect for you, ma’am, upon my 
life you mustn’t. No, really, you know. When a man with 
the feelings of a gentleman finds himself engaged to a young 
lady, and it comes (even on the part of a member of the fam- 
ily) to vipers, you know ! — I would merely put it to your 
own good feeling, you know,” said Mr. Sampson, in rather 
lame conclusion. 

Mrs. Wilfer’s baleful stare at the young gentleman in ac- 
knowledgment of his obliging interference was of su(;h a 
nature that Miss Lavinia burst into tears, and caught him 
round the neck for his protection. 

“ My own unnatural mother,” screamed the young lady, 
“ wants to annihilate George ! But you shan’t be annihilat- 
ed, George. I’ll die first I ” 

Mr. Sampson, in the arms of his mistress, still struggled to 
shake his head at Mrs. Wilfer, and to remark : “ With every 
sentiment of respect for you, you know, ma’am — vipers real- 
ly doesn’t do you credit.” 

“ You shall not be annihilated, George ! ” cried Miss La- 
vinia. “ Ma shall destroy me first, and then she’ll be con- 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


277 


tented. Oh, oh, oh ! Have I lured G-eorge from his happy 
home to expose him to this ! George, dear, be free ! Leave 
me, ever dearest G-eorge, to Ma and to my fate. G-ive my 
love to your aunt, George dear, and implore her not to curse 
the viper that has crossed your path and blighted your exist- 
ence, Oh, oh, oh I ” The young lady, who, hysterically 
speaking, was only just come of age, and had never gone off 
yet, here fell into a highly creditable crisis, which, regarded 
as a first performance, was very successful ; Mr. Sampson 
bending over the body meanwhile in a state of distraction, 
which induced him to address Mrs, Wilfer in the inconsistent 
expressions : “ Demon — with the highest respect for you — 
behold your work ! ” 

Within a few weeks afterwards, the Mendicant’s bride 
(arm-in-arm with the Mendicant) came to tea, in fulfillment 
of an engagement made through her father. 

“ Dearest Ma,” cried Bella, running into the room with a 
radiant face, “ how do you do, dearest Ma ? ” And then em- 
braced her, joyously. And Lavvy darling, how do you do, 
and how’s G-eorge Sampson, and how is he getting on, and 
when are you going to be married, and how rich are you 
going to grow ? You must tell me all about it, Lavvy dear, 
immediately. John, love, kiss Ma and Lavvy, and then we 
shall all be at home and comfortable.” 

Mrs. Wilfer stared, but was helpless. Miss Lavinia stared, 
but was helpless. Apparently with no compunction, and 
assuredly with no ceremony, Bella tossed her bonnet away, 
and sat down to make tea. 

“ And now you will naturally want to know, dearest Ma 
and Lavvy, how we live, and what we have got to live upon. 
Well, we live on Blackheath, in the charm — ingest of dolls’ 
houses, de — lightfully furnished, and we have a clever little 
servant who is de — cidedly pretty, and we are economical 
and orderly, and do everything by clock-work, and we have 
a hundred and fifty pounds a year, and we have all we want, 
and more. And lastly, if you would like to know in con- 
fidence, as perhaps you may, what is my opinion of my hus- 
band, my opinion is — that I almost love him ! ” 

“ And if you would like to know in confidence, as perhaps 
you may,” said her husband, smiling, as he stood by her side, 


278 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


without her having detected his approach, “ my opinion of 
my wife, my opinion is — ” But Bella started up, and put her 
hand upon his lips. 

“ Stop, sir ! No, John, dear ! Seriously I Please not yet 
awhile ! I want to be something so much worthier than 
the doll in the doll’s house.” 

“ My darling, are you not ? ” 

“Not half, not a quarter, so much worthier as I hope you 
may some day find me ! Try me through some reverse, 
John — try me through some trial — and tell them after that, 
what you think of me.” 

“ I will, my Life,” said John. “ I promise it.” 

“That’s my dear John. And you won’t speak a word 
now ; will you ? ” 

“ And I won’t,” said John, with a very expressive look of 
admiration around him, “ speak a word now ! ” 

She laid her laughing cheek upon his breast to thank him, 
and said, looking at the rest of them sidewise out of her 
bright eyes : “ I’ll go further. Pa and Ma and Lavvy. John 
don’t suspect it — he has no idea of it — but I quite love him ! ” 

The newly -married pair left early, so that they might 
walk at leisure to their starting-place from London, for 
Grreenwich. 

Her married life glided happily on. She was alone all 
day, for, after an early breakfast, her husband repaired every 
morning to the City, and did not return until their late din- 
ner hour. He was “ in a China house,” he explained to Bel- 
la ; which she found quite satisfactory, without pursuing the 
China house into minuter details than a wholesale vision of 
tea, rice, odd-smelling silks, carved boxes, and tight-eyed 
people in more than double-soled shoes, with their pigtails 
pulling their hair off, painted on transparent porcelain. 

“You have such a cheerful spirit! ” said John, fondly. 
“ Y ou are like a bright light in the house.” 

“ Am I truly, John ? ” 

“Are you truly? Yes, indeed. Only much more and 
much better.” 

“Do you know, John dear,” said Bella, taking him by a 
button of his coat, “ that I sometimes, at odd moments— 
don’t laugh, John, please.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


279 


Nothing should induce John to do it, when she asked him 
not to do it. 

“ — That I sometimes think, John. I feel a little serious.” 

“ Are you too much alone, my darling ? ” 

‘‘ 0 dear, no, J ohn ! The time is so short that I have not 
a moment too much in the week.” 

“ Why serious, my life, then ? When serious ? ” 

“ When I laugh, I think,” said Bella, laughing as she laid 
her head upon his shoulder. “ You wouldn’t believe, sir, 
that I feel serious now? But I do.” And she laughed 
again, and something glistened in her eyes. 

Would you like to be rich, pet ? ” he asked her coaxingly. 

Rich, J ohn ! How can you ask such goose’s ques- 
tions ? ” 

Do you regret,, anything, my love ? ” 

“ Regret anything ? No ! ” Bella confidently answered. 
But then, suddenly changing, she said between laughing and 
glistening : Oh yes, I do though. I regret Mrs. Boffin ! ” 

“ I, too, regret that separation very much. But perhaps 
it is only temporary. Perhaps things may so fall out, as that 
we may sometimes see her again.” Bella might be very 
anxious on the subject, but she scarcely seemed so at the 
moment. With an absent air, she was investigating that 
button on her husband’s coat, when Pa came in to spend the 
evening. 

“ You go a little way with Pa, John ? ” said Bella, when 
the visit was over. 

Yes, my dear. Do you?” 

I have not written to Lizzie Hexam since I wrote and 
told her that I really had a lover — a whole one. I am in the 
humor to tell her so to-night, John, and I’ll stay at home and 
do it. G-ood-night, you dear, good, gentle Pa ! ” 

Left to herself, she wrote Lizzie a long letter. She had 
but completed it, when her husband came back. “ You are 
just in time, sir,” said Bella ; I am going to give you your 
first curtain lecture. It shall be a parlor-curtain lecture. 
You shall take this chair, and you’ll soon find yourself taken 
to task soundly. Now, sir 1 To begin at the beginning. 
What is your name ? ” 

A question more decidedly rushing at the secret he was 


280 


CONDENSED CLASSICS, 


keeping from her, could not have astounded him. But he 
kept his countenance and his secret, and answered, “John 
Eokesmith, my dear.” 

“ Good boy ! Who gave you that name ? ” 

With a returning suspicion that something might have 
betrayed him to her, he answered, interrogatively, “My 
godfathers and my godmothers, dear love ? ” 

“ Pretty good ! ” said Bella. “ Not goodest good, because 
you hesitate about it. However, as you know your Cate- 
chism fairly, so far. I’ll let you off the rest. Now, I am go- 
ing to examine you out of my own head. John, dear, why 
did you go back this evening, to the question you once asked 
me before — would I like to be rich ? ” 

Again, his secret ! He looked down at her as she looked 
up at him, with her hands folded on his knee, and it was as 
nearly told as ever secret was. 

Having no reply ready, he could do no better than em- 
brace her. 

“In short, dear John, this is the topic of my lecture : I 
want nothing on earth, and I want you to believe it.” 

“ If that’s all, the lecture may be considered over, for I 
do.” 

“It’s not all, John, dear,” Bella hesitated. “It’s onl}” 
Firstly. There’s a dreadful Secondly, and a dreadful Thirdly 
to come — as I used to say to myself in sermon-time when I 
was a very small-sized sinner at church.” 

“ Let them come, my dearest.” 

“ Are you sure, J ohn dear ; are you absolutely certain in 
your innermost heart of hearts, there is no remembrance 
that I was once very mercenary ? ” 

“ Why, if there were no remembrance in me of the time 
you speak of,” he softly asked her with his lips to hers, 
“ could I love you quite as well as I do ; could I have in the 
Calendar of my life the brightest of its days ; could I when- 
ever I look at your dear face, or hear your dear voice, see and 
hear my noble champion? It can never have been that 
which made you serious, darling ? ” 

“ No, J ohn, it wasn’t that, and still less w'as it Mrs. Boffin, 
though I love her. Wait a moment, and I’ll go on with the 
lecture. Give me a moment, because I like to cry for joy. 
It’s so delicious, John dear, to cry for joy.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


281 


She did so on his neck, and, still clinging there, laughed a 
little when she said, “ I think I am ready now for Thirdly, 
John.” 

“ I am ready for Thirdly,” said John, ‘‘ whatever it is.” 

“ I believe John,” pursued Bella, “ that you believe that I 
believe — ” 

“ My dear child,” cried her husband, gayly, “ what a quan- 
tity of believing I ” 

Isn’t there ? ” said Bella, with another laugh. ‘‘ I never 
knew such a quantity ! It’s like verbs in an exercise. But 
I can’t get on with less believing. I’ll try again. I believe, 
dear John, that you believe that I believe that we have as 
much money as we require, and that we want for nothing.” 

“ It is strictly true, Bella.” 

“ But if our money should by any means be rendered 
not so much — if we had to stint ourselves a little in pur- 
chases that we can afford to make now — would you still 
have the same confidence in my being quite contented, 
John ? ” 

“ Precisely the same confidence, my soul.” 

“Thank you, John dear, thousands upon thousands of 
times. And I may take it for granted, no doubt,” with a lit- 
tle faltering, “ that you would be quite as contented your- 
self, John ? But, yes, I know I may. For, knowing that I 
should be so, how surely I may know that you would be so ; 
you who are so much stronger, and firmer, and more reason- 
able and more generous, than I am.” 

“ Hush ! ” said her husband, “ I must not hear that. You 
are all wrong there, though otherwise as right as can be. And 
now I am brought to a little piece of news, my dearest, that 
I might have told you earlier in the evening. I have strong 
reason for confidently believing that we shall never be in the 
receipt of a smaller income than our present income.” 

She might have shown herself more interested in the in- 
telligence ; but she had returned to the investigation of the 
coat-button that had engaged her attention a few hours be- 
fore, and scarcely seemed to heed what he said. 

“ And now we have got to the bottom of it at last,” cried 
her husband, rallying her, “ and this is the thing that made 
you serious ? ” 


282 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“Ko, dear,” said Bella, twisting the button and shaking 
her head, “ it wasn’t this.” 

“ Why then. Lord bless this little wife of mine, there’s a 
Fourthly ! ” exclaimed John. 

“ This worried me a little, and so did Secondly,” said Bel- 
la, occupied with the button, “ but it was quite another sort 
of seriousness — a much deeper and quieter sort of serious- 
ness — that I spoke of, John dear.” 

As he bent his face to hers, she raised hers to meet it, and 
laid her little right hand on his eyes, and kept it there. 

“ Do you remember, John, on the day we were married. 
Pa’s speaking of the ships that might be sailing towards us 
from the unknown seas ? ” 

“ Perfectly, my darling ! ” 


“ I think among them there is a ship upon 

the ocean bringing to you and me 


a httle baby, J ohn.” 


CHAPTER XL VIII. 

T he Paper Mill had stopped work for the night, and the 
paths and roads in its neighborhood were sprinkled 
with clusters of people going home from their day’s labor. 

It was Saturday evening, and there was a sort of little 
Fair in the village. 

The various sounds arising from it, and floating away into 
the still air, made the evening, at any point which they just 
reached fitfully, mellowed by the distance, more still by con- 
trast. Such was the stillness to Eugene Wray burn, as he 
walked by the river with his hands behind him. 

He walked slowly, and with the measured step and preoc- 
cupied air of one who was waiting. He walked between 
two points, an osier-bed at this end and some floating lilies 
at that, and at each point stopped and looked expectantly 
in one direction. 

“ It is very quiet,” said he. 

A rustle in a field beyond the hedge attracted his atten- 
tion. What’s here to do ? ” he asked himself, leisurely go- 
ing towards the gate and looking over. No jealous paper- 
miller ? No pleasures of the chase in this part of the coun- 
try ? Mostly fishing hereabouts ! ” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


283 


The field had been newly mown, and there were yet the 
marks of the scythe on the yellow-green ground, and the 
track of wheels where the hay had been carried. Following 
the tracks with his eyes, the view closed wdth the new hay- 
rick in the corner. 

Now, if he had gone on to the hayrick, and gone round 
it ? But, say that the event w^as to be, as the event fell out, 
and how idle are such suppositions! Besides, if he had 
gone ; what is there of warning in a bargeman lying on his 
face ? 

A bird flying to the hedge,” was all he thought about it ; 
and came back, and resumed his walk. 

If I had not a reliance on her being truthful,” said Eu- 
gene' after taking some half-dozen turns, “ I should begin to 
think she had given me the slip for the second time. But she 
promised, and she is a girl of her word.” 

Turning again at the water-lilies, he saw her coming, and 
advanced to meet her. 

“ I was saying to myself, Lizzie, that you were sure to 
come, though you were late.” 

“ I had to linger through the village as if I had no object 
before me, and I had to speak to several people in passing 
along, Mr. Wray burn.” 

“ Are the lads of the village — and the ladies — such scan- 
dal-mongers? ” he asked, as he took her hand and drew it 
through his arm. 

She submitted to walk slowly on, with downcast eyes. 
He put her hand to his lips, and she quietly drew it away. 

“ Will you walk beside me, Mr. Wrayburn, and not touch 
me ? ” For his arm was already stealing round her waist. 

She stopped again, and gave him an earnest supplicating 
look. “Well, Lizzie, w^ell 1 ” said he, in an easy way, though 
ill at ease with himself, “ don’t be unhappy, don’t be re- 
proachful! ” 

“ I cannot help being unhappy, but I do not mean to be 
reproachful. Mr. Wrayburn, I implore you to go away from 
tliis neighborhood, to-morrow morning.” 

“ Lizzie, Lizzie, Lizzie ! ” he remonstrated. “ As weU be 
reproachful as wholly unreasonable. I can’ t go away.” 

“Why not?” 


284 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Faith ! ” said Eugene in his airily candid manner. “ Be- 
cause you won’t let me. Mind 1 1 don’t mean to be reproach- 
ful either. I don’t complain that you design to keep me 
here. But you do it, you do it.” 

“Will you walk beside me, and not touch me,” for his 
arm was coming about her again j “ while I speak to you 
very seriously, Mr. Wrayburn ? ” 

“ I will do anything within the limits of possibility, for 
you, Lizzie,” he answered with pleasant gayety as he folded 
his arms. “ See here ! Bonaparte at St. Helena.” 

“ When you spoke to me as I came from the Mill, the 
night before last,” said Lizzie, fixing her eyes upon him with 
the look of supplication which troubled his better nature, 
“ you told me that you were much surprised to see me, and 
that you were on a fishing-excursion. W as it true ? ” 

“ It was not,” replied Eugene, composedly, “ in the least 
true. I came here, because I had information that I should 
find you here.” 

“ Can you imagine why I left London, Mr. Wrayburn ? ” 

“ I am afraid, Lizzie, that you left London to get rid of me. 
It is not flattering to my seK-love, but I am afraid you did.” 
“I did.” 

“ How could you be so cruel ? ” 

“ 0 Mr. Wrayburn,” she answered, suddenly breaking in- 
to tears, “is the cruelty on my side? 0 Mr. Wrayburn, is 
there no cruelty in your being here to-night ? ” 

“In the name of all that’s good — and that is not conjur- 
ing you in my own name, for Heaven knows I am not good ” 
— said Eugene, “ don’t be distressed ! ” 

“ What else can I be, when I know the distance and the 
difference between us ? What else can I be, when to tell 
me why you came here is to put me to shame ? ” said Lizzie, 
covering her face. 

He looked at her with a real sentiment of remorseful ten- 
derness and pity. It was not strong enough to impel him 
to sacrifice himself and spare her, but it was a strong emo- 
tion. 

“ Lizzie ! I never thought before, that there was a wo- 
man in the world who could affect me so much by saying so 
little. But don’t be hard in your construction of me. Y ou 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


285 


don’t know what my state of mind towards you is. You 
don’t know how you haunt me and bewilder me. You don’t 
know how the cursed carelessness that is over-officious in 
helping me at every other turning of my life, won’t help me 
here. You have struck it dead, I think, and I sometimes 
almost wish you had struck me dead along with it.” 

“It grieves you to see me distressed, Mr. Wrayburn; it 
grieves me to see you distressed. I don’t reproach you. In- 
deed I don’t reproach you. You have not felt this as I feel 
it, being so different from me, and beginning from another 
point of view. You have not thought. But I entreat you 
to think now, think now ! ” 

“ What am I to think of ? ” asked Eugene, bitterly. 

“Think of me.” 

“Tell me how not to think of you, Lizzie, and you’ll 
change me altogether.” 

“ I don’t mean in that way. Think of me, as belonging to 
another station, and quite cut off* from you in honor. Re- 
member that I have no protector near me, unless I have one 
in your noble heart. Respect my good name. If you feel 
toward me, in one particular, as you might if I was a la- 
dy, give me the full claims of a lady upon your generous 
behavior. I am removed from you and your family by be- 
ing a working-girl. How true a gentleman to be as consid- 
erate of me as if I was removed by being a queen ! ” 

His face expressed contrition and indecision as he asked : 

“ Have I injured you so much, Lizzie ? ” 

“Ho, no. Y ou may set me quite right. I don’t speak of 
the past, Mr. Wrayburn, but of the present and the future. 
Are we not here now, because through two days you have 
followed me so closely where there are so many eyes to see 
you, that I consented to this appointment as an escape ? ” 

“ Again, not very flattering to my self-love,” said Eugene, 
moodily ;“ but yes. Yes. Yes.” 

“ Then I beseech you, Mr. Wrayburn, I beg and pray you, 
leave this neighborhood. If you do not, consider to what 
you will drive me.” 

He did consider within himself for a moment or two, and 
then retorted, “ Drive you ? To what shall I drive you ? ” 
“You Avill drive me away. I live here peacefully and re- 


286 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


spected, and I am well employed here. Y on will force me 
to quit this place as I quitted London, and — by f ollowing me 
again — will force me to quit the next place in which I may 
find refuge, as I quitted this.” 

“ Are you so determined, Lizzie — forgive the word I am 
going to use, for it’s literal truth — to fly from a lover ? ” 

‘‘I am so determined,” she answered, resolutely, though 
trembling, “ to fly from such a lover. Mr. Wray burn, if I 
believed — but I do not believe — that you could be so cruel 
to me as to drive me from place to place to wear me out, you 
should drive me to death and not do it.” 

He looked full at her handsome face, and in his own hand- 
some face there was a fight of blended admiration, anger, 
and reproach, which she — who loved him so in secret — 
whose heart had long been so full, and he the cause of its 
overflowing — drooped before. She tried hard to retain her 
firmness, but he saw it melting away under his eyes. In the 
moment of its dissolution, and of his first full knowledge of 
his influence upon her, she dropped, and he caught her on 
his arm. 

“ Lizzie ! Rest so a moment. Answer what I ask you. 
If I had not been what you call removed from you and cut 
oS from you, would you have made this appeal to me to 
leave you ? ” 

I don’t know, I don’t know. Don’t ask me, Mr. Wray- 
burn. Let me go back.” 

“ I swear to you, Lizzie, you shall go directly. I swear to 
you, you shall go alone. I’ll not accompany you, I’U not 
follow you, if you will reply.” 

“ How can I, Mr. Wray burn ? How can I tell you what I 
should have done, if you had not been what you are ? ” 

“ If I had not been what you make me out to be,” he 
struck in, skillfully changing the form of words, “ would you 
still have hated me ? ” 

“0 Mr. Wrayburn,” she replied appealingly, and weep- 
ing, “ you know me better than to think I do I ” 

‘Hf I had not been what you make me out to be, Lizzie, 
would you still have been indifferent to me ? ” 

0 Mr. Wrayburn,” she answered as before, “you know 
me better than that too ! ” 


OUB miTUAL FRIEND. 


287 


There was something in the attitude of her whole figure as 
he supported it, and she hung her head, which besought him 
to be merciful and not force her to disclose her heart. He 
was not merciful with her, and he made her do it. 

“ If I knoAv you better than quite to believe (unfortunate 
dog though I am !) that you hate me, or even that you are 
wholly indifferent to me, Lizzie, let me know so much more 
from yourself before we separate. Let me know how you 
would have dealt with me if you had regarded me as being 
what you would have considered on equal terms with you.” 

‘Ht is impossible, Mr. Wray burn. How can I think of 
you as being on equal terms with me ? If my mind could 
put you on equal terms with me, you could not be yourself. 
How could I remember, then, the night when I first saw 
you, and when I went out of the room because youlooked at 
me so attentively ? Or the night that passed into the morn- 
ing when you broke to me that my father was dead ? Or 
the nights when you used to come to see me at my next 
home ? Or your having known how uninstructed I was, 
and having caused me to be taught better ? Or my having 
so looked up to you and wondered at you, and at first 
thought you so good to be at all mindful of me ? ” 

Only ‘ at first ’ thought me so good, Lizzie ? What did 
you think me after ^ at first ’ ? So bad ? ” 

“ I don’t say that. I don’t mean that. But after the first 
wonder and pleasure of being noticed by one so difierent 
from any one who had ever spoken to me, I began to feel 
that it might have been better if I had never seen you.” 

‘‘Why?” 

“ Because you were so different,” she answered in a lower 
voice. “Because it was so endless, so hopeless. Spare 
me ! ” 

“ Did you think for me at all, Lizzie ? ” 

“ Hot much, Mr. W rayburn. Not much until to-night.” 

“ Will you tell me why ? ” 

“ I never supposed until to-night that you needed to be 
thought for. But if you do need to be ; if you do truly feel 
at heart that you have indeed been towards me what you 
have called yourself to-night, and that there is nothing for 
us in this life but separation; then Heaven help you, and 
Heaven bless you ! ” 


288 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


The purity with which in these words she expressed 
something of her own love and her own suffering, made a 
deep impression on him for the passing time. He held her, 
almost as if she were sanctified to him by death, and kissed 
her, once, almost as he might have kissed the dead. 

‘‘ I promised that I would not accompany you, nor follow 
you. Shall I keep you in view ? You have been agitated, 
and it’s growing dark.” 

I am used to be out alone at this hour, and I entreat you 
not to do so.” 

I promise. I can bring myself to promise nothing more 
to-night, Lizzie, except that I will try what I can do.” 

“ There is but one means, Mr. Wray burn, of sparing your- 
seK and of sparing me, every way. Leave this neighbor- 
hood to-morrow morning.” 

“ I will try.” 

As he spoke the words in a grave voice, she put her hand 
in his, removed it, and went away by the river-side. 

‘‘Now, could Mortimer believe this?” murmured Eu- 
gene, still remaining, after awhile, where she had left him. 
“ Can I even believe it myself ? ” 

He referred to the circumstance that there were tears up- 
on his hand, as he stood covering his eyes. 

He strolled on, unconscious of his way. Looking above, 
he found that the young moon was up, and that the stars 
were beginning to shine in the sky from which the tones of 
red and yellow were flickering out, in favor of the cahn blue 
of a summer night. He was still by the river-side. Turn- 
ing suddenly, he met a man, so close upon him that Eugene, 
surprised, stepped back, to avoid a collision. The man car- 
ried something over his shoulder which might have been a 
broken oar, or spar, or bar, and took no notice of him, but 
passed on. 

“Halloa, friend!” said Eugene, calling after him, “are 
you blind ? ” 

The man made no reply, but went his way. 

Eugene Wray burn went the opposite way. He came 
within hearing of the village sounds, and came to the ])ridge. 
The inn where he stayed, like the village and the mill, was 
not across the river, but on that side of the stream on which 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND, 


289 


he walked. However, knowing the rushy bank and the 
backwater on the other side to be a retired place, and feeling 
out of humor for noise or company, he crossed the bridge, 
and sauntered on : looking up at the stars as they seemed 
one by one to be kindled in the sky, and looking down at the 
river as the same stars seemed to be kindled deep in the 
water. A landing-place overshadowed by a willow, and a 
pleasure-boat lying moored there among some stakes, 
caught his eye as he passed along. The spot was in such 
dark shadow, that he paused to make out what was there, 
and then passed on again. 

The rippling of the river seemed to cause a correspondent 
stir in his uneasy reflections. He would have laid them 
asleep if he could, but they were in movement, like the 
stream, and all tending one way with a strong current. As 
the ripple under the moon broke unexpectedly now and 
then, and palely flashed in a new shape and with a new 
sound, so parts of his thoughts started, unbidden, from the 
rest, and revealed their wickedness. Out of the question 
to marry her,” said Eugene, and out of the question to 
leave her. The crisis I ” 

He had sauntered far enough. Before turning to retrace 
his steps, he stopped upon the margin, to look down at the 
reflected night. In an instant, with a dreadful crash, the re- 
flected night turned crooked, flames shot jaggedly across the 
air, and the moon and stars came bursting from the sky. 

Was he struck by lightning ? With some incoherent half- 
formed thought to that effect, he turned under the blows 
that were blinding him and mashing his life, and closed with 
a murderer, whom he caught by a red neckerchief — unless 
the raining down of his own blood gave it that hue. 

Eugene was light, active, and expert ; but his arms were 
broken, or he was paralyzed, and could do no more than 
hang on to the man, with his head swung back, so that he 
could see nothing hut the heaving sky. After dragging at 
the assailant, he fell on the bank with him, and then there 
was another great crash, and then a splash, arid all was done. 

Lizzie Hexam, too, had avoided the noise, and the Satur- 
day movement of people in the straggling street, and chose 
19 


290 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


to walk alone by the water until her tears should be dry, and 
she could so compose herself as to escape remark upon her 
looking ill or unhappy on going home. The peaceful sereni- 
ty of the hour and place, having no reproaches or evil inten- 
tions within her breast to contend against, sank healingly 
into its depths. She had meditated and taken comfort. 
She, too, was turning homeward, when she heard a strange 
sound. 

It startled her, for it was like a sound of blows. She stood 
still, and listened. It sickened her, for blows fell heavily 
and cruelly on the quiet of the night. As she listened, un- 
decided, all was silent. As she yet listened, she heard a 
faint groan, and a fall into the river. 

Her old bold life and habit instantly inspired her. With- 
out vain waste of breath in crying for help where there were 
none to hear, she ran towards the spot from which the 
sounds had come. It lay between her and the bridge, but it 
was more removed from her than she had thought; the 
night being so very quiet, and sound traveling far with the 
help of water. , 

At length, she reached a part of the green bank, much and 
newly trodden, where lay some broken splintered pieces of 
wood and torn fragments of clothes. Stooping, she saw 
that the grass was bloody. Following the drops and smears, 
she saw that the watery margin of the bank was bloody. 
Following the current with her eyes, she saw a bloody face 
• turned up towards the moon, and drifting away. 

Now, merciful Heaven be thanked for that old time, and 
grant, 0 Blessed Lord, that through thy wonderful work- 
ings it may turn to good at last ! To whomsoever the drift- 
ing face belongs, be it man’s or woman’s, help my humble 
hands, Lord G-od, to raise it from death and restore it to some 
one to whom it must be dear ! 

It was thought, fervently thought, but not for a moment 
did the prayer check her. She was away before it welled up 
in her mind, away, swift and true, yet steady above all — for 
without steadiness it could never be done — to the landing 
place under the willow tree, where she also had seen a boat 
lying moored among the stakes. 

A sure touch of her old practiced hand, a sure step of her 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


291 


old practiced foot, a sure dght balance of her body, and sbe 
was in tbe boat. A quick glance of ber practiced eye showed 
ber, even tbrougb tbe deep dark shadow, the sculls in a rack 
against the red-brick garden-wall. Another moment, and 
sbe bad cast off (taking the line with her), and the boat bad 
shot out into tbe moonlight and she was rowing down the 
stream as never other woman rowed on English water. 

Intently over her shoulder, without slackening speed, she 
looked ahead for the driving face. She passed the scene of 
the struggle — yonder it was, on her left, well over the boat’s 
stern — she passed on her right, the end of the village street, 
a hilly street that almost dipped into the river ; its sounds 
were growing faint again, and she slackened ; looking as the 
boat drove, everywhere, everywhere, for the floating face. 

She merely kept the boat before the stream now, and 
rested on her oars, knowing well that if the face were not 
soon visible, it had gone down, and she would overshoot it. 
An untrained sight would never have seen by the moonlight 
what she saw at the length of a few strokes astern. She 
saw the drowning figure rise to the surface, slightly struggle, 
and as if by instinct turn over on its back to float. Just so 
had she first dimly seen the face which she now dimly saw 
again. 

Firm of look and firm of purpose, she intently watched its 
coming on, until it was very near ; then, with a touch un- 
shipped her sculls, and crept aft in the boat, between kneel- 
ing and crouching. Once, she let the body evade her, not 
being sure of her grasp. Twice, and she had seized it by its 
bloody hair. 

It was insensible, if not virtually dead ; it was mutilated, 
and streaked the water all about it with dark red streaks. 
As it could not help itself, it was impossible for her to get it 
on board. She bent over the stern to secure it with the line,” 
and then the river and its shores rang to the terrible cry she 
uttered. 

But, as if possessed by supernatural spirit and strength, 
she lashed it safe, resumed her seat, and rowed in, desperate- 
ly, for the nearest shallow water where she might run the 
boat aground. Desperately, but not wildly, for she knew 
that if she lost distinctness of intention, all was lost and gone. 


292 


COJ^^DENSED CLASSICS. 


She ran the boat ashore, went into the water, released him 
from the line, and by main strength lifted him in her arms 
and laid him in the bottom of the boat. He had fearful 
wounds upon him, and she bound them up with her dress 
torn into strips. Else, supposing him to be still alive, she 
foresaw that he must bleed to death before he could be land- 
ed at his inn, which was the nearest place for succor. 

This done very rapidly, she kissed his disfigured forehead, 
looked up in anguish to the stars, and blessed him and for- 
gave him, if she had anything to forgive.” It was only in 
that instant that she thought of herself, and then she thought 
of herself only for him. 

Now, merciful Heaven be thanked for that old time, ena- 
bling me, without a wasted moment, to have got the boat 
afloat again, and to row back against the stream ! And grant, 
0 Blessed Lord Grod, that through poor me he may be raised 
from death, and preserved to some one else to whom he may 
be dear one day, though never dearer than to me ! 

She rowed hard — rowed desperately, but never wildly — 
and seldom removed her eyes from him in the bottom of the 
boat. She had so laid him there, as that she might see his 
disfigured face ; it was so much disfigured that his mother 
might have covered it, but it was above and beyond disfig- 
urement in her eyes. 

The boat touched the edge of the patch of inn lawn, slop- 
ing gently to the water. There were lights in the windows, 
but there chanced to be no one out-of-doors. She made the 
boat fast, and again by main strength took him up, and nev- 
er laid him down until she laid him down in the house. 

Surgeons were sent for, and she sat supporting his head. 
She had oftentimes heard in days that were gone, how doc- 
tors would lift the hand of an insensible wounded person, 
and would drop it if the person were dead. She waited for 
the awful moment when the doctors might lift this hand, all 
broken and bruised, and let it fall. 

The first of the surgeons came, and asked, before proceed- 
ing to his examination, ‘‘ Who brought him in ? ” 

I brought him in, sir,” answered Lizzie. 

“You, my dear? You could not lift, far less carry, this 
wdght.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


293 


I think I could not, at another time, sir ; but I am sure I 


did.” 


The surgeon looked at her with great attention, and with 
some compassion. Having with a grave face touched the 
wounds upon the head, and the broken arms, he took the 
hand. 

0 ! would he let it drop ? 

He appeared irresolute. He did not retain it, but laid it 
gently down, took a candle, looked more closely at the inju- 
ries on the head, and at the pupils of the eyes. That done, he 
replaced the candle and took the hand again. Another sur- 
geon then coming in, the two exchanged a whisper, and the 
second took the hand. Heither did he let it fall at once, but 
kept it for a while and laid it gently down. 

“Attend to the poor girl,” said the first surgeon then. 
“ She is quite unconscious. She sees nothing and hears 
nothing. All the better for her! Don’t rouse her, if you 
can help it ; only move her. Poor girl, poor girl 1 She must 
be amazingly strong of heart, but it is much to be feared that 
she has set her heart upon the dead. Be gentle with her.” 


CHAPTER XLIX. 



AY was breaking at Plashwater W eir Mill Lock. This 


jL_7 earth looked spectral, and so did the pale stars : while 
the cold eastern glare, expressionless as to heat or color, with 
the eye of the firmament quenched, might have been likened 
to the stare of the dead. 

Perhaps it was so likened by the lonely bargeman, stand- 
ing on the brink of the lock. For certain, Bradley Head- 
stone looked that way, when a chill air came up, and when 
it passed on murmuring, as if it whispered something that 
made the phantom trees and water tremble — or threaten — • 
for fancy might have made it either. 

He turned away, and tried the lock-house door. It was 
fastened on the inside. 

“ Is he afraid of me ? ” he muttered, knocking. 

Rogue Riderhood was soon roused, and soon undrew the 
bolt and let him in. 

“ Why, T’otherest, I thought you had been and got lost I 


294 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Two nights away ! I a’most believed as you’d giv’ me the 
slip, and I had as good as half a mind for to advertise you in 
the newspapers to come for’ard.” 

Y ery remarkably, Riderhood put no question to him. He 
had looked at him on opening the door, and he now looked 
at him again (stealthily this time), and the result of his look- 
ing was, that he asked him no question. 

“ You’ll be for another forty on ’em, governor, as I judges, 
afore you turns your mind to breakfast,” said Riderhood. 

“ Yes. I had better sleep, I think,” said Bradley. 

myself should recommend it, governor,” assented 
Riderhood. “ Might you be anyways dry ? ” 

‘‘Yes. I should like a drink,” said Bradley. 

Mr. Riderhood got out his bottle, and fetched his jug-full 
of water, and administered a potation. Then he shook the 
coverlet of his bed and spread it smooth, and Bradley 
stretched himself upon it in the clothes he wore. Mr. Rider- 
hood, poetically remarking that he would pick the bones of 
his night’s rest, in his wooden chair, sat in the window as be- 
fore ; but, as before, watched the sleeper narrowly until he 
was very sound asleep. Then he rose and looked at him 
close, in the bright daylight, on every side with great mi- 
nuteness. He went out to his lock to sum up what he had 
seen. 

“ One of his sleeves is tore right away below the elber, 
and the t’other had a good rip at the shoulder. He’s been 
hung on to, pretty tight, for his shirt’s all tore out of the neck 
gathers. He’s been in the grass, and he’s been in the water. 
And he’s spotted, and I know with what and with whose. 
Hooroar.” 

Bradley slept long. Early in the afternoon a barge came 
down. Other barges had passed through, both ways, before 
it ; but the lock-keeper hailed only this particular barge, for 
news, as if he had made a time calculation with some nicety. 
The men on board told him a piece of news, and there was a 
lingering on their part to enlarge upon it. 

Twelve hours had intervened since Bradley’s lying down, 
when he got up. “Hot that I s waller it,” said Riderhood, 
squinting at his lock, when he saw Bradley coming out of 
the house, “ as you’ve been a-sleeping ah the time, old 
boyl” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


295 


Bradley came to him, sitting on his wooden lever, and 
asked what o’clock it was? Eiderhood told him it was be- 
tween two and three. 

‘‘ When are you relieved ? ” asked Bradley. 

Day arter to-morrow, governor.” 

“ Not sooner ? ” 

“ Not a inch sooner, governor.” 

On both sides, importance seemed attached to this ques- 
tion of relief. Eiderhood quite petted his reply ; saying a 
second time, and prolonging a negative roll of his head, 

n — n — not a inch sooner, governor.” 

‘‘ Did I tell you I was going on to-night ? ” asked Bradley. 

“ No, governor,” returned Eiderhood, in a cheerful, affa- 
ble, and conversational manner, you did not tell me so. 
But most like you meant to it and forgot to it. How, other- 
ways, could a doubt have come into your head about it, gov- 
ernor ? ” 

“ As the sun goes down, I intend to go on,” said Bradley. 

“ So much the more necessary is a Peck,” returned Eider- 
hood. “ Come in and have it, T’otherest.” 

The serving of the “ peck ” was the affair of a moment ; it 
consisting in the handing down of a capacious baking dish 
with three-fourths of an immense meat pie in it, and the pro- 
duction of two pocket-knives, an earthenware mug, and a 
large brown bottle of beer. 

Bradley Headstone was so remarkably awkward that the 
Eogue observed it. 

“ Look out, T’otherest ! you’ll cut your hand I ” 

But, the caution came too late, for Bradley gashed it at the 
instant. And, what was more unlucky, in asking Eiderhood 
to tie it up, and in standing close to him for the purpose, he 
shook his hand under the smart of the wound, and shook 
blood over Eiderhood’s dress. 

Eiderhood looked at Bradley, and with an evil eye. 

“ T’otherest ! ” he said, hoarsely, as he bent across the ta- 
ble to touch his arm. “ The news has gone down the river 
afore you.” 

“ What news ? ” 

“ Who do you think,” said Eiderhood, with a hitch of his 
head, as if he disdainfully jerked the feint away, “ picked up 
the body? Guess.” 


296 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


I am not good at guessing anything.” 

“She did. Hooroarl You had him there agin. She 
did.” 

The convulsive twitching of Bradley Headstone’s face, 
and the sudden hot humor that broke out upon it, showed 
how grimly the intelligence touched him. 

“ I have been so long in want of rest,” said he, “ that with 
your leave I’ll lie down again.” 

“ And welcome, T’otherest ! ” was the hospitable answer 
of his host. He had laid himself down without waiting for 
it, and he remained upon the bed until the sun was low. 
When he arose and came out to resume his journey, he found 
his host waiting for him on the grass by the towing-path 
outside the door. 

“Whenever it may be necessary that you and I should 
have any further communication together,” said Bradley, 
“ I will come back. Good-night I ” 

“Well, since no better can be,” said Biderhood, turning 
on his heel, “Good-night! ” But he turned again as the 
other set forth, and added under his breath, looking after 
him with a leer : “You wouldn’ t be let to go like that, if my 
Belief warn’t as good as come. I’ll catch you up in a mile.” 

His real time of relief being that evening at sunset, his 
mate came lounging in, within a quarter of an hour, and 
Biderhood straightway followed on the track of Bradley 
Headstone. 

He was a better follower than Bradley. It had been the 
calling of his life to slink and skulk and dog and waylay, and 
he knew his calling well. His man looked back pretty oft- 
en as he went, but got no hint of him. He knew a thou- 
sand arts beyond the doomed Bradley’s slow conception. 

But all his arts were brought to a stand-still, like himself, 
when Bradley, turning into a green lane by the river-side — 
a solitary spot run wild in nettles, briers, and brambles, and 
encumbered with the scathed trunks of a whole hedgerow 
of felled trees, on the outskirts of a little wood — began step- 
ping on these trunks and dropping down among them and 
stepping on them again, apparently as a school-boy might 
have done, but assuredly with no school-boy purpose, or 
want of purpose. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


297 


“ What are you up to ? ” muttered Riderhood, down in 
the ditch, and holding the hedge a little open with both 
hands. “ By Greorge and the Draggin ! if he ain’t a-going 
to bathe ! ” 

Rogue Riderhood watched the bather dressing. And 
now gradually came the wonder that he stood up, complete- 
ly clothed, another man, and not the bargeman. 

Aha ! ” said Riderhood. ‘‘ Much as you was dressed 
that night. I see. You’re a taking me with you, now. 
You’re deep. But I knows a deeper.” 

When the bather had finished dressing, he kneeled on the 
grass, doing something with his hands, and again stood up 
with his bundle under his arm. Looking all around him 
with great attention, he then went to the river’s edge, and 
flung it in as far, and yet as lightly as he could. It was not 
until he was so decidedly upon his way again as to be be- 
yond a bend of the river and for the time out of view, that 
Riderhood scrambled from the ditch. 

“ Now,” was his debate with himself, “ shall I foller you 
on, or shall I let you loose for this once, and go a-fishing ? 
I’ll let you loose this once, and go a-fishing ! ” With that, 
he suddenly dropped the pursuit and turned. 

The miserable man whom he had released for the time, 
but not for long, went on towards London. 

The school re-opened next day. The scholars saw little 
or no change in their master’s face, for it always wore its 
slowly laboring expression. But, as he heard his classes, he 
was always doing the deed and doing it better. As he paus- 
ed with his piece of chalk at the blackboard before writing 
on it, he was thinking of the spot, and whether the water 
was not deeper and the fall straighter, a little higher up, or a 
little lower down. He had half a mind to draw aline or 
two upon the board, and show himself what he meant. He 
was doing it again and improving on the manner, at prayers, 
in his mental arithmetic, all through his questioning, all 
through the day. 

Charley Hexam was a master now, in another school 
under another head. It was evening, and Bradley Avas 
walking in his garden observed from behind a blind by gen- 
tle little Miss Beecher, who contemplated offering him a 


298 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


loan of her smelling salts for headache, when Mary Anne, in 
faithful attendance, ma’am, held up her arm. 

“ Yes, Mary Anne ? ” 

Young Mr. Hexam, if you please, ma’am, coming to see 
Mr. Headstone.” 

“Very good, Mary Anne.” 

Again Mary Anne held up her arm. 

“ You may speak, Mary Anne.” 

“ Mr. Headstone has beckoned young Mr. Hexam into 
his house, ma’am, and he has gone in himself without wait- 
ing for young Mr. Hexam to come up, and now he has gone 
in too, ma’am, and has shut the door.” 

“ With all my heart, Mary Anne.” 

Again Mary Anne’s telegraphic arm worked. 

“ What more, Mary Anne ? ” 

“ They must find it rather dull and dark. Miss Peecher, 
for the parlor blind’s down, and neither of them pulls it up.” 

“ There is no accounting for tastes, Mary Anne.” 

Charley, entering the dark room, stopped short when he 
saw his old friend in its yellow shade. 

“ Come in, Hexam, come in.” 

Charley advanced to take the hand that was held out to 
him ; but stopped again, short of it. The heavy, bloodshot 
eyes of the schoolmaster, rising to his face with an effort, 
met his look of scrutiny. 

“ Mr. Headstone, what’s the matter ? ” 

“ Matter ? Where ? ” 

“ Mr. Headstone, have you heard the news ? About the 
fellow, Mr. Eugene Wray burn ? That he is killed ? ” 

“ He is dead, then ? ” exclaimed Bradley. 

Young Hexam standing looking at him, he moistened his 
lips with his tongue, looked about the room, glanced at his 
former pupil, and looked down. “ I heard of the outrage,” 
said Bradley, trying to constrain his working mouth, “ but I 
had not heard the end of it.” 

“ Where were you,” said the boy, advancing a step as he 
lowered his voice, “ when it was done ? Stop ! I don’t ask 
that. Don’t tell me. If you force your confidence upon 
me, Mr. Headstone, I’ll give up every word of it. Mind ! 
Take notice. I’ll give up it, and I’ll give up you. I will ! ” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


299 


The wretched creature seemed to suffer acutely under this 
renunciation. A desolate air of utter and complete loneh- 
ness fell upon him, like a visible shade. 

It’s for me to speak, not you,” said the boy. If you do, 
you’ll do it at your peril. I am going to put your selfish- 
ness before you, Mr. Headstone — your passionate, violent, 
and ungovernable selfishness — to show you why I can, and 
why I will, have nothing more to do with you. If you had 
any part — I don’t say what — in this attack,” pursued the 
boy ; or if you know anything about it — I don’t say how 
much — or if you know who did it — I go no closer — you did 
an injury to me that’s never to be forgiven. Y ou know that 
I took you with me to his chambers in the Temple when I 
told him my opinion of him, and made myself responsible 
for my opinion of you. Y ou know that I took you whth me 
when I was watching him with a view to recovering my sis- 
ter and bringing her to her senses ; you know that I have al- 
lowed myself to be mixed up with you, all through this busi- 
ness, in favoring your desire to marry my sister. And how 
do you know that, pursuing the ends of your own violent 
temper, you have not laid me open to suspicion ? Is that 
your gratitude to me, Mr. Headstone ? When I speak of my 
sister, I devoutly wish that you had never seen her, Mr. 
Headstone. I explained her character to you, and how she 
interposed some ridiculous fanciful notions in the way of 
our being. as respectable as I tried for. Y ou fell in love with 
her, and I favored you, with all my might. She could not 
be induced to favor you, and so we came into collision Avith 
this Mr. Eugene Wrayburn. How, what have you done ? 
Why, you have justified my sister in being firmly set against 
you from first to last, and you have put me in the wrong 
again ! It is,” he Avent on, actually Avith tears, “ an extra- 
ordinary circumstance attendant on my life, that every ef- 
fort I make towards perfect respectability, is impeded by 
somebody else through no fault of mine ! Hot content with 
doing what I have put before you, you will drag my name 
into notoriety through dragging my sister’s — Avhich you 
are pretty sure to do, if my suspicions have any foundation 
at all — and the Avorse you prove to be, the harder it will be 
for me to detach myself from being associated with you in 


300 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


people’s minds. However, I have made up my mind that I 
will become respectable in the scale of society, and that I 
will not be dragged down by others. I have done with my 
sister as well as with you.” 


CHAPTER L. 


N a certain day. Miss Wren was alone at her work. 



with the house-door set open for coolness, and was 
trolling in a small sweet voice a mournful little song which 
might have been the song of the doll she was dressing, be- 
moaning the brittleness and meltability of w^ax, when whom 
should she descry standing on the pavement, looking in at 
her, but Mr. Fledgeby. 

I thought it was you ! ” said Fledgeby, coming up the 
two steps. 

“Hid you? ” Miss Wren retorted. “And I thought it 
was you, young man. Quite a coincidence. You’re not 
mistaken, and I’m not mistaken. How clever we are ! ” 

“ Well, and how are you ? ” said Fledgeby. 

“ I am pretty much as usual, sir,” replied Miss Wren. “ To 
what am I to attribute the honor and favor ? ” 

“ To a wish to improve your acquaintance,” Mr. Fledgeby 
replied. 

Miss Wren, stopping to bite her thread, looked at him 
very knowingly. 

“ We never meet now,” said Fledgeby ; “ do w^e ? ” 

“ Ho,” said Miss Wren, chopping off the word. 

“So I had a mind,” pursued Fledgeby, “to come and 
have a talk with you about our dodging friend, the child of 


Israel.” 


“ So he gave you my address ; did he ? ” asked Miss Wren. 
“ I got it out of him,” said Fledgeby, with a stammer. 
“ He’s the dodgerest of the dodgers. What’s he up to in 
the case of your friend the handsome gal? He must have' 
some object. What’s his object ? ” 

“ Cannot undertake to say, sir, I am sure ! ” 

“ He won’t acknowledge where she’s gone,” said Fledge- 
by ; “ and I have a fancy that I should like to have another 
look at her. How I know he know^s wdiere she is gone.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


301 


‘‘ Cannot undertake to say, sir, I am sure ! ” 

“ And you know where she is gone,” hazarded Fledge by. 

“ Cannot undertake to say, sir, really.” 

At a loss how to resume his fascinating part in the dia- 
logue, at length he said : 

“ Miss Jenny ! — That's your name, if I don’t mistake ? ” 

‘‘ Probably you don’t mistake, sir,” was Miss Wren’s cool 
answer ; “ because you had it on the best authority. Mine, 
you know.” 

“ Look here,” said Fledgeby, I take it for granted, that 
to get the most of your materials for nothing would be well 
worth your while. Miss Jenny ? ” 

‘‘ You may take it for granted,” returned the dressmaker 
with many knowing nods, that it’s always well worth my 
while to make money.” 

“Now,” said Fledgeby, approvingly, “you’re answering 
to a sensible purpose. Now, you’re coming out and looking 
alive! So I make so free, Miss Jenny, as to offer the re- 
mark, that you and Judah were too thick together to last. 
You can’t come to be intimate with such a deep file as 
Judah without beginning to see a little way into him, you 
know.” 

“ I must own,” returned the dressmaker, with her eyes 
upon her work, “ that we are not good friends at present.” 

“ I know you’re not good friends at present,” said Fledge- 
by. “ I know all about it. I should like to pay off Judah, 
by not letting him have his own deep way in everything. I 
should be glad to countermine him, respecting the handsome 
gal, your friend. He means something there. You may 
depend upon it, Judah means something there. He has a 
motive, and of course his motive is a dark motive. Now, 
whatever his motive is, it’s necessary to his motive” — Mr. 
Fledgeby’s constructive powers were not equal to the avoid- 
ance of some tautology here — “ that it should be kept from 
me, what he has done with her. So I put it to you, who 
know : What has he done with her ? I ask no more. And 
is that asking much, when you understand that it will pay ? ” 

“ Where d’ye live ? ” 

“ Albany, Picadilly,” replied Fledgeby. 

“ When are you at home ? ” 


302 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“When you like.”' 

“ Breakfast- time ? ” said Jenny, in her abruptest and 
shortest manner. 

“ ISTo better time in the day,” said Fledgeby. 

“ I’ll look in upon you to-morrow, young man. Mark you ! 
I promise you nothing,” said the dolls’ dressmaker, dabbing 
two dabs at him with her needle, as if she put out both his 
eyes. 

“No, no. 7 understand,” returned Fledgeby. “The 
damage and waste question shall be settled first. It shall 
be made to pay. Grood-day, Miss Jenny.” 

“ Grood-day, young man.” 

The dolls’ dressmaker was on the alert next morning, and 
drove to Bond Street, and set down two ladies punctually, 
and then directed her equipage, as she quaintly called her 
crutch-stick, to conduct her to the Albany. Arrived at the 
door-w^ay of the house in which Mr. Fledgeby’s chambers 
were, she found a lady standing there in a traveling dress, 
holding in her hand — of all things in the world — a gentle- 
man’s hat. 

“ You w^ant some one ? ” said the lady iff a stern manner. 

“ I am going up-stairs to Mr. Fledgeby’s.” 

“You cannot do that at this moment. There is a gentle- 
man with him.” 

While speaking, and afterwards, the lady kept watchfully 
between her and the staircase, as if prepared to oppose her 
going up, by force. The lady being of a stature to stop her 
with a hand, and looking mightily determined, the dress- 
maker stood still. 

“ Well ? Why do you listen ? ” asked the lady. 

“ I am not listening,” said the dressmaker. 

“ What do you hear ? ” asked the lady. 

“ Is it a kind of spluttering somewhere ? ” said the dress- 
maker, with an inquiring look. 

“ Mr. Fledgeby in his shower-bath, perhaps,” remarked 
the lady, smiling. 

“ And somebody’s beating a carpet, I think.” 

“ Mr. Fledgeby’s carpet, I dare say,” replied the smiling 
lady. 

“I hope there’s nothing the matter!” said the dress- 
maker. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


303 


Where ? ” inquired the lady. 

“ I don’t know where,” said Miss Wren, staring about her. 
“ But I never heard such odd noises. Don’t you think I had 
better call somebody ? ” 

“ I think you had better not,” returned the lady, with a 
significant frown, and drawing closer. 

Soon afterwards, came a slamming and banging of doors ; 
and then came running down-stairs a gentleman with 
whiskers, and out of breath, who seemed to be red-hot. 

“ Is your business done, Alfred ? ” inquired the lady. 

“Very thoroughly done,” replied the gentleman, as he 
took his hat from her. 

“You can go up to Mr. Fledgeby as soon as you like,” 
said the lady, moving haughtily away. 

“ Oh ! And you can take these three pieces of stick with 
you,” added the gentleman, politely, “ and say, if you please, 
that they come from Mr. Alfred Lammle, with his compli- 
ments on leaving England. Mr. Alfred Lammle. Be so 
good as not to forget the name.” 

The three pieces of stick were three broken and frayed 
fragments of a stout lithe cane. 

With a gleam of new intelligence in her sharp face, the 
dolls’ dressmaker pulled at Fledgeby’s bell. ISTo one an- 
swered ; but from within the chambers proceeded a contin- 
uous spluttering sound of a highly singular and unintelligible 
nature. 

“ Grood gracious ! Is Little Eyes choking ? ” cried Miss 
Jenny. 

Pulling at the bell again and getting no reply, she pushed 
the outer door, and found it standing ajar. No one being 
visible on her opening it wider, and the spluttering continu- 
ing, she took the liberty of opening an inner door, and then 
beheld the extraordinary spectacle of Mr. Fledgeby in a 
shirt, a pair of Turkish trousers, and a Turkish cap, rolling 
over and over on his own carpet, and spluttering wonder- 
fully. 

“ Oh Lord ! ” gasped Mr. Fledgeby. “ Oh my eye ! Stop 
thief ! I am strangling. Fire ! Oh my eye ! Grive me a 
glass of water. Shut the door. Murder ! Oh Lord ! And 
then rolled and spluttered more than ever. 


304 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Hurrying into another room, Miss Jenny got a glass of 
water, and brought it for Fledgeby’s relief: who, gasping, 
spluttering, and rattling in his throat between whiles, drank 
some water, and laid his head faintly on her arm. 

“ Oh my eye! ” cried Fledgeby, struggling anew. “It’s 
salt and snufF, It’s up my nose, and down my throat, and 
in my windpipe. Ugh! Ow ! Ow! Ow ! Ah — h — h — h!” 
And here, crowing fearfully, with his eyes starting out of 
his head, he appeared to be contending with every mortal 
disease incidental to poultry. 

“ And Oh my Eye, I’m so sore ! ” cried Fledgeby, starting 
over on his back, in a spasmodic way that caused the dress- 
maker to retreat to the wall. “ Oh I smart so ! Do put 
something to my back and arms, and legs and shoulders. 
Ugh ! It’s down my throat again and can’t come up. Ow ! 
Ow ! Ow ! Ah — h — h — ^h ! Oh ! I smart so ! ” Here 
Mr. Fledgeby bounded up, and bounded down, and went 
rolling over and over again. 

The dolls’ dressmaker looked on until he rolled himself in- 
to a corner with his Turkish slippers uppermost, and then, 
resolving in the first place to address her ministration to the 
salt and snuff', gave him more water and slapped his back. 
But the latter application was by no means a success, caus- 
ing Mr. Fledgeby to scream, and to cry out, “ Oh my eye ! 
don’t slap me ! I’m covered with weales and I smart so ! ” 

However, he gradually ceased to choke and crow, saving 
at intervals, and Miss Jenny got him into an easy-chair: 
where, with his eyes red and watery, with his features swol- 
len, and with some half-dozen livid bars across his face, he 
presented a most rueful sight. 

“ Shall I go for the police ? ” inquired Miss Jenny, with a 
nimble start towards the door. 

“Stop! Ho, don’t!” cried Fledgeby. “Don’t, please. 
W e had better keep it quiet. Will you be so good as shut the 
door ? Oh I do smart so ! ” 

In testimony of the extent to which he smarted Mr. 
Fledgeby came wallowing out of the easy-chair, and took 
another roll on the carpet. 

“ How, the door’s shut,” said Mr. Fledgeby, sitting u]') in 
anguish, with his Turkish cap half on and half off) and the 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


305 


bars on his face getting bluer, “ do me the kindness to look at 
my back and shoulders. They must be in an awful state, for 
I hadn’t got my dressing-gown on, when the brute came 
rushing in. Cut my shirt away from the collar ; there’s a 
pair of scissors on that table. Oh! ” he groaned, with his 
hand to his head again. How I do smart, to be sure ! ” 

“ There ? ” inquired Miss Jenny, alluding to the back and 
shoulders. 

“ Oh Lord, yes ! ” moaned Fledgeby, rocking liimseK. 
“ And all over 1 Everywhere 1 ” 

The busy little dressmaker quickly snipped the shirt away, 
and laid bare the results of as furious and sound a thrashing 
as ever Mr. Fledgeby merited. “You may well smart, 
young man 1 ” exclaimed Miss Jenny. And stealthily 
rubbed her little hands behind him, and poked a few exult- 
ant pokes with her two forefingers over the crown of his 
head. 

“ What do you think of vinegar and brown paper ? ” in- 
quired the suffering Fledgeby, still rocking and moaning. 
“ Hoes it look as if vinegar and brown paper was the sort of 
application ? ” 

“Yes,” said Miss Jenny, with a silent chuckle. “ It looks 
as if it ought to be pickled.” 

Mr. Fledgeby collapsed under the word “pickled,” and 
groaned again. “My kitchen is on this floor,” he said; 
“ You’ll find brown paper in a dresser-drawer there, and a 
bottle of vinegar on a shelf. Would you have the kindness 
to make a few plasters and put ’em on ? It can’t be kept too 
quiet.” 

“ One, two — hum — five, six. Yoq’ll want six,” said the 
dressmaker. 

“ There’s smart enough,” whimpered Mr. Fledgeby, 
groaning and writhing again, “ for sixty.” 

Miss Jenny repaired to the kitchen, scissors in hand, 
found the brown paper and found the vinegar, and skillfully 
cut out and steeped six large plasters. When they were all 
lying ready on the dresser, an idea occurred to her as she was 
about to gather them up. 

“ I think,” said Miss Jenny, with a silent laugh, “ he ought 
to have a little pepper? Just a few grains? I tliiuk the 
20 


306 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


young man’s tricks and manners make a claim upon his 
friends for a little pepper ? ” 

Mr. Fledgeby’s evil star showing her the pepper-hox on 
the chimney-piece, she climbed upon a chair, and got it 
down, and sprinkled all the plasters with a judicious hand. 
She then went back to Mr. Fledgeby, and stuck them all on 
him : Mr. Fledgeby uttering a sharp howl as each was put in 
its place. 

“ There, young man ! ” said the dolls’ dressmaker. “ Now 
I hope you feel pretty comfortable ? ” 

Apparently, Mr. Fledgeby did not, for he cried by way of 
answer, “ Oh — h how I do smart ! ” 

Miss Jenny got his Persian gown upon him, extinguished 
his eyes crookedly with his Persian cap, and helped him to 
his bed : upon which he climbed groaning. “ Business be- 
tween you and me being out of the question to-day, young 
man, and my time being precious,” said Miss Jenny then, 
“ I’ll make myself scarce. Are you comfortable now* ? ” 

“ Oh my eye ! ” cried Mr. Fledgeby. “ No, I ain't. Oh — 
h — h ! how I do smart ! ” 

The last thing Miss Jenny saw, as she looked back before 
closing the room door, was Mr. Fledgeby in the act of plung- 
ing and gamboling all over his bed, like a porpoise or dolphin 
in its native element. 


CHAPTER LI. 

S ET down by an omnibus at the corner of Saint Mary 
Axe, and trusting to her feet and her crutch-stick within 
its precincts, the dolls’, dressmaker proceeded to the place of 
business of Pubsey and Co. All there was sunny and quiet 
externally, and shady and quiet internally. Hiding herself 
in the entry outside the glass-door, she could see from that 
post of observation the old man in his spectacles sitting writ- 
ing at his desk. 

“ Boh ! ” cried the dressmaker, popping in her head at the 
glass-door. Mr. W olf at home ? ” 

The old man took his glasses off, and mildly laid them 
down beside him. Ah, Jenny, is it you ? I thought you 
had given me up.” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


107 


“ And so I had given up the treacherous wolf of the for- 
est,” she replied; “ but, godmother, it strikes me you have 
come back. I am not quite sure, because the wolf and you 
change forms. I want to ask you a question or two, 
whether you are godmother or really wolf. May I ? ” 

“ Yes, Jenny, yes.” But Riah glanced tow'ards the door, 
as if he thought his principal might appear there. 

‘‘ If you’re afraid of the fox,” said Miss Jenny, “ you may 
dismiss all present expectations of seeing that animal. He 
won’t show himself abroad for many a day.” 

“ What do you mean, my child ? ” 

mean, godmother,” replied Miss Wren, sitting down 
beside the Jew, “ that the fox has caught a famous flogging, 
and that if his skin and bones are not tingling, aching, and 
smarting at this present instant, no fox did ever tingle, ache, 
and smart.” Therewith Miss J enny related what had come 
to pass in the Albany, omitting the few grains of pepper. 

Now, godmother,” she went on, “ I particularly wish to 
ask you what has taken place here, since I left the wmlf 
here ? Because I have an idea about the size of a marble, 
rolling about in my little noddle. First and foremost, are 
you Pubsey and Co., or are you either ? Upon your solemn 
word and honor.” 

The old man shook his head. 

“ Secondly, isn’t Fledgeby both Pubsey and Co ? ” 

The old man answered with a reluctantnod. 

My idea,” exclaimed Miss Wren, “ is now about the size 
of an orange, but before it gets any bigger, welcome back, 
dear godmother ! ” 

The little creature folded her arms about the old man’s 
neck with great earnestness, and kissed him. “ I humbly beg 
your forgiveness, godmother. I am truly sorry. I ought 
to have had more faith in you. But what could I suppose 
when you said nothing for yourself, you know ? I don’t 
mean to offer that as a justification, but what could I sup- 
pose, when you were a silent party to all he said ? It did 
look bad ; now didn’t it ? ” 

‘‘ It looked bad, Jenny,” responded the old man, with 
gravity. “ But, my dear, I promised that you should pursue 
your questions.” 


308 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ So you gave notice that you were going ? Does that 
come next ? ” asked Miss Jenny. 

I indited a letter to my master. Yes. To that effect.” 

“And what said Tingling-Tossing-Aching-Screaming- 
Scratching-Smarter ? ” asked Miss Wren, with an unspeaka- 
ble enjoyment in the utterance of those honorable titles and 
in the recollection of the pepper. 

“ He held me to certain months of servitude, which were 
his lawful term of notice. They expire to-morrow. Upon 
their expiration — not before — I had meant to set myself 
right with my Cinderella.” 

“ My idea is getting so immense now,” cried Miss Wren, 
clasping her temples, “ that my head won’t hold it ! Little 
Eyes (that’s Screaming-Scratching-Smarter) owes you a 
heavy grudge for going. Little Eyes casts about how best 
to pay you off. Little Eyes thinks of Lizzie. Little Eyes 
says to himself, ‘ I’ll find out where he has placed that girl, 
and I’ll betray his secret because it’s dear to him.’ Perhaps 
Little Eyes thinks, ‘ I’ll make love to her myself too;’ but 
that I can’t swear — all the rest I can. So, Little Eyes comes 
to me, and I go to Little Eyes. That’s the way of it. And 
now the murder’s all out, I’m sorry that I didn’t give him 
Cayenne pepper and chopped pickled Capsicum ! ” 

A shadow darkened the entry, and the glass-door was 
opened by a messenger who brought a letter unceremoni- 
ously addressed, Riah.” To which he said there was an 
answer wanted. 

The letter, which was scrawled in pencil uphill and down- 
hill and round crooked corners, ran thus : 

“Old Riah, 

“ Your accounts being all squared, go. Shut up the 
place, turn out directly, and send me the key by bearer. 
Gro. Y ou are an unthankful dog of a J ew. G-et out. 

“ F.” 

The old man got his few goods together in a black bag. 
That done, the shutters of the upper windows closed, and 
the office blind pulled down, they issued forth upon the steps 
with the attendant messenger. There, while Miss Jenny 
held the bag, the old man locked the house-door, and handed 
over the key to him ; who at once retired with the same. 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


309 


“Well, godmother, ” said Miss Wren, as they remained 
upon the steps together, looking at one another. “ And so 
you’re thrown upon the world ! ” 

“ It would appear so, Jenny, and somewhat suddenly.” 

“ Where are you going to seek your fortune ? ” 

The old man smiled, but looked about him with a look of 
having lost his way in life, which did not escape the dolls’ 
dressmaker. 

“ The best'thing you can do,” said Jenny, “for the time 
being, at all events, is to come home with me, godmother. 
Nobody’s there but my bad child, and Lizzie’s lodging stands 
empty.’’ The old man, when satisfied that no inconvenience 
could be entailed on any one by his compliance, readily com- 
plied ; and the singularly-assorted couple once more went 
through the streets together. 

Now, the bad child having been strictly charged by his 
parent to remain at home in her absence, of course went out ; 
and, being in the very last stage of mental decrepitude, went 
out with two objects; first, to establish a claim he con- 
ceived himself to have upon any licensed victualer living, to 
be supplied with threepenny worth of rum for nothing ; and 
secondly, to bestow some maudlin remorse on Mr. Eugene 
Wray burn, and see what profit came of it. 

There was nobody at the Chambers but Young Blight. 
That discreet youth, sensible of a certain incongruity in the 
association of such a client with the business that might be 
coming some day, with the best intentions temporized with 
Dolls, and offered a shilling for coach-hire home. Mr. Dolls, 
accepting the shilling, promptly laid it out in two threepen- 
nyworths of conspiracy against his life, and two threepen- 
nyworths of raging repentance. Eeturning to the Cham- 
bers with which burden, he was descried coming round in- 
to the court, by the wary Young Blight watching from the 
wundow, who instantly closed the outer door, and left the 
miserable object to expend his fury on the panels. 

The more the door resisted him, the more dangerous and 
imminent became that bloody conspiracy against his life. 
Force of police arriving, he recognized in them the conspira- 
tors, and laid about him hoarsely, fiercely, staringly, con- 
vulsively, foamingly. A humble machine, familiar to the 


310 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


conspirators and called by the expressive name of Stretcher, 
being unavoidably sent for, he v^as rendered a harmless 
bundle of torn rags by being strapped down upon it, with 
voice and consciousness gone out of him, and life fast going. 
As this machine was borne out at the Temple gate by four 
men, the poor little dolls’ dressmaker and her Jewish friend 
were coming up the street. 

Let us see what it is,” cried the dressmaker. “ Let us 
make haste and look, godmother.” 

The brisk little crutch-stick was but too brisk. “ 0 gen- 
tlemen, gentlemen, he belongs to me ! ” 

‘‘ Belongs to you ? ” said the head of the party, stopping it. 

“ 0 yes, dear gentlemen, he’s my child, out without leave. 
My poor bad, bad boy ! and he don’t know me, he don’t 
know me! 0 what shall I do,” cried the little creature, 
wildly beating her hands together, “ when my own child 
don’t know me ! ” 

The head of the party looked to the old man for explana- 
tion. He whispered, as the dolls’ dressmaker bent over the 
exhausted form and vainly tried to extract some sign of re- 
cognition from it : “ It’s her drunken father.” 

As the load was put down in the street, Riah drew the 
head of the party aside, and whispered that he thought the 
man was dying. “Ho, surely not? ’’returned the other. 
But he became less confident, on looking, and directed the 
bearers to “ bring him to the nearest doctor’s shop.” 

Thither he was brought ; and medical testimony was more 
precise and more to the purpose than it sometimes is in a 
Court of Justice. “You had better send for something to 
cover it. All’s over.” 

Therefore, the police sent for something to cover it, and it 
was covered and borne through the streets, the people fall- 
ing away. After it, went the dolls’ dressmaker, hiding her 
face in the Jewish skirts, and clinging to them with one 
hand, while with the other she plied her stick. It w^as car- 
ried home, and, by reason that the staircase was very nar- 
row, it was put down in the parlor — the little working- 
bench being set aside to make room for it — and there, in the 
midst of the dolls with no speculation in their eyes, lay Mr. 
Dolls with no speculation in his. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


311 


The simple arrangements were of Miss Jenny’s own mak- 
ing, and were stated to Riah thus : 

“ I mean to go alone, godmother, in my usual carriage, 
and you’ll be so kind as to keep house while I am gone. It’s 
not far off. And when I return, we’ll have a cup of tea, and 
a chat over future arrangements.” 

After that previous carrying of him in the streets, the 
wretched old fellow seemed to be twice buried. He was 
taken on the shoulders of half a dozen blossom-faced men, 
who shuffled with him to the church-yard, yet the spectacle 
of only one little mourner hobbling after, caused many peo- 
ple to turn their heads with a look of interest. 

I must have a very short cry, godmother, before I cheer 
up for good,” said the little creature, coming in. “ Because 
after all a child is a child, you know.” 

It was a longer cry than might have been expected. How- 
beit, it wore itself out in a shadowy corner, and then the 
dressmaker came forth, washed her face, and made the tea. 

A knock was heard at the street door. Riah went to open 
it, and presently came back, ushering in, with the grave and 
courteous air that sat so well upon him, a gentleman. 

The gentleman was a stranger to the dressmaker; but 
even in the moment of his casting his eyes upon her, there 
was something in his manner which brought to her remem- 
brance Mr. Eugene Wrayburn. 

“ Pardon me,” said the gentleman. “ You are the dolls’ 
dressmaker ? ” 

“ I am the dolls’ dressmaker, sir.” 

“ Lizzie Hexam’s friend ? ” 

‘‘ Yes, sir,” replied Miss Jenny, instantly on the defensive, 

and Lizzie Hexam’s friend.” 

Here is a note from her, entreating you to accede to the 
request of Mr. Mortimer Lightwood, the bearer.” 

“It’s very short,” said Jenny, with a look of wonder, 
Avhen she had read it. 

“ There was no time to make it longer. Time was so very 
precious. My dear friend Mr. Eugene Wrayburn is dying.” 

The dressmaker clasped her hands, and uttered a little 
piteous cry. 

“ Is dying,” repeated Lightwood, with emotion, “ at some 


312 


CONDEJSSED CLASSICS. 


distance from here. He is almost always insensible. In a 
short restless interval of sensibility, or partial sensibility, I 
made out that he asked for you to be brought to sit by him. 
Hardly relying on my own interpretation of the indistinct 
sounds he made, I caused Lizzie to hear them. W e were 
both sure that he asked for you.” 

The dressmaker, with her hands still clasped, looked af- 
frightedly from the one to the other of her two companions. 

“ If you delay, he may die with his request ungratified, 
with his last wish — intrusted to me — we have long been 
much more than brothers — unfulfilled.” 

In a few moments the black bonnet and the crutch-stick 
were on duty, the good Jew was left in possession of the 
house, and the dolls’ dressmaker, side by side in a chaise 
with Mortimer Lightwood, was posting out of town. 


CHAPTER LII. 


DARKENED and hushed room ; the river outside the 



windows flowing on to the vast ocean ; a figure on the 
bed, swathed and bandaged and bound, lying helpless on its 
back, with its two useless arms in splints at its sides. Only 
two days of usage so familiarized the little dressmaker with 
this scene, that it held the place occupied two days ago by 
the recollections of years. 

He had scarcely moved since her arrival. Sometimes his 
eyes were open, sometimes closed. When they were open, 
there was no meaning in their unwinking stare at one spot 
straight before them, unless for a moment the brow knitted 
into a faint expression of anger or surprise. Then Morti- 
mer Lightwood would speak to him, and on occasions he 
would be so far roused as to make an attempt to pronounce 
his friend’s name. But in an instant consciousness was 
gone again, and no spirit of Eugene was in Eugene’s crushed 
outer form. 

They provided Jenny with materials for plying her work, 
and she had a little table placed at the foot of his bed. Sit- 
ting there, with her rich shower of hair falling over the 
* chair-back, they hoped she might attract his notice. With 
the same object, she would sing, just above her breath, when 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


313 


he opened his eyes, or she saw his brow knit into that faint 
expression, so evanescent that it was like a shape made in 
water. But as yet he had not heeded. The “ they here 
mentioned, were the medical attendant; Lizzie, who was 
there iii all her intervals of rest ; and Lightwood, who never 
left him. 

The two days became three, and the three days became 
four. At length, quite unexpectedly, he said something in 
a whisper. 

What was it, my dear Eugene ? ” 

“Will you, Mortimer — ” 

Will I—?” 

—“Send for her?” 

“ My dear fellow, she is here.” 

Quite unconscious of the long blank, he supposed that 
they were still speaking together. 

The little dressmaker stood up at the foot of the bed, hum- 
ming her song, and nodded to him brightly. “ I can’t shake 
hands, Jenny,” said Eugene, with something of his old look ; 
“ but I am very glad to see you.” 

Mortimer repeated this to her, for it could only be made 
out by bending over him and closely watching his attempts 
to say it. In a little while, he added : 

“ Ask her if she has seen the children.” 

Mortimer could not understand this, neither could Jenny 
herself, until he added : 

“ Ask her if-she has smelled the flowers ? ” 

“ Oh ! I know ! ” cried J enny. “ I understand him now ! ” 
Then Lightwood yielded his place to her quick approach, 
and she said, bending over the bed, with that better look : 
“ You mean my long bright slanting rows of children, who 
used to bring me ease and rest ? You mean the children who 
used to take me up, and make me light ? ” 

Eugene smiled, “Yes.” 

“ I have not seen them since I saw you. I never see them 
now, but I am hardly ever in pain now.” 

“ It was a pretty fancy,” said Eugene. 

“ But I have heard my birds sing,” cried the little creature, 
“ and I have smelled my flowers. Yes, indeed I have ! And 
both were most beautiful and most Divine ! ” 


314 


CONDENSED CLASSICS, 


“ Stay and help to nurse me,” said Eugene, quietly. “ I 
should like you to have the fancy here, before I die.” 

She touched his lips with her hand, and shaded her eyes 
with that same hand as she went back to her work and her 
httle low song. He heard the song with evident pleasure, 
until she allowed it gradually to sink away into silence. 

Mortimer.” 

“ My dear Eugene.” 

If you can give me anything to keep me here for only a 
few minutes — ” 

To keep you here, Eugene.” 

“ To prevent my wandering away I don’t know where — 
for I begin to be sensible that I have just come back, and that 
I shall lose myself again — do so, dear boy ! ” 

Mortimer gave him such stimulants as could be given him 
with safety, and bending over him once more, was about to 
caution him, when he said : 

“ Don’t tell me not to speak, for I must speak. If you 
knew the harassing anxiety that gnaws and wears me when 
I am wandering in those places — where are those endless 
places ? Tbey must be at an immense distance ! ” 

He saw in his friend’s face that he was losing himself ; for 
he added after a moment : Don’t be afraid — I am not gone 
yet. What was it?” 

“You wanted to tell me something, Eugene.” 

“ This attack, my dear Mortimer ; this murder — ” 

His friend leaned over him with renewed attention, say- 
ing : “You and I suspect some one.” 

“ More than suspect. But Mortimer, while I lie here, and 
when I lie here no longer, I trust to you that the perpetrator 
is never brought to justice.” 

“Eugene?” 

“ Her innocent reputation would be ruined, my friend. 
She would be punished, not he. I have wronged her enough 
in fact; I have wronged her still more in intention. You 
recollect what pavement is said to be made of good inten- 
tions. It is made of bad intentions too. Mortimer, I am 
lying on it, and I know ! ” 

“Be comforted, my dear Eugene.” 

“ I will, when you have promised me. Listen to what I 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


315 


say to you. It was not the schoolmaster, Bradley Head- 
stone. Do you hear me ? Twice ; it was not the school- 
master, Bradley Headstone. Do you hear me? Three 
times ; it was not'the schoolmaster, Bradley Headstone.” 

He stopped, exhausted. His speech had been whispered, 
broken, and indistinct; but by a great eftbrt he had made it 
plain enough to be unmistakable. 

“ Dear fellow. I am wandering away. Stay me for an- 
other moment, if you can.” 

Lightwood lifted his head at the neck, and put a wine- 
glass to his lips. He rallied. 

“ I don’t know how long ago it was done, whether weeks, 
days, or hours. Ho matter. There is inquiry on foot, and 
pursuit.’ Say ! Is there not ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Check it ; divert it ! Don’t let her be brought in ques- 
tion. Shield her. The guilty man, brought to justice, would 
poison her name. Let the guilty man go unpunished. Liz- 
zie and my reparation before all ! Promise me ! ” 

“ Eugene, I do. I promise you ! ” 

In the act of turning his eyes gratefully towards his 
friend, he wandered away. 

The dolls’ dressmaker, all softened compassion now, 
watched him with an earnestness that never relaxed. And 
through this close watching (if through no secret sympathy 
or power) the little creature attained an understanding of 
him that Lightwood did not possess. Mortimer would often 
turn to her, as if she were an interpreter between this sen- 
tient world and the insensible man ; and she would change 
the dressing of a wound, or ease a ligature, or turn his face, or 
alter the pressure of the bedclothes on him, with an absolute 
certainty of doing right. The natural lightness and delicacy 
of touch which had become very refined by practice in her 
miniature work, no doubt was involved in this ; but her per- 
ception was at least as fine. 

One afternoon when he had been lying still, and Lizzie, 
unrecognized, had just stolen out of the room to pursue her 
occupation, he uttered Lightwood’s name. 

“ My dear Eugene, I am here.” 

‘‘ How long is this to last, Mortimer ? ” 


316 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Lightwood shook his head. “Still, Eugene, you are no 
worse than you were.” 

“ But I know there’s no hope. Yet I pray it may last long 
enough for you to do me one last service, and for me to do 
one last action. Keep me here a few moments, Mortimer.” 

His friend gave him what aid he could, and encouraged 
him to believe he was more composed, though even then his 
eyes were losing the expression they so rarely recovered. 

“ Hold me here, dear fellow, if you can. Stop my wander- 
ing away. I am going ! ” 

“Not yet, not yet. Tell me, dear Eugene, what is it I 
shall do ? ” 

“ Keep me here for only a single minute. I am going 
away again. Don’t let me go. Hear me speak first. Stop 
me — stop me ! ” 

“ My poor Eugene, try to be calm.” 

“ I do try. I try so hard. If you only knew how hard ! 
Don’t let me wander till I have spoken. Grive me a httle 
more wine.” 

Lightwood complied. Eugene, with a most pathetic 
struggle against the unconsciousness that was coming over 
him, and with a look of appeal that affected his friend pro- 
foundly, said : 

“ You can leave me with Jenny, while you speak to her 
and tell her what I beseech of her. You can leave me with 
J enny , while you are gone. There’s not much for you to do. 
You won’t be long away.” 

“No, no, no. But tell me what it is I shall do, Eugene ! ” 

“I am going! You can’t hold me.” 

“ Tell me in a word, Eugene I ” 

His eyes were fixed again, and the only word that came 
from his lips was the word millions of times repeated. Liz- 
zie, Lizzie, Lizzie. 

But the watchful little dressmaker had been vigilant as 
ever in her watch, and she now came up and touched Light- 
wood’s arm as he looked down at his friend, despairingly. 

“ Hush I ” she said, with her finger on her lips. “ His eyes 
are closing. He’ll be conscious when he next opens them.” 

She whispered in his ear one short word of a single sylla- 
ble. Lightwood started, and looked at her. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


317 


“ Try it,” said the little creature, with an excited and ex- 
ultant face. She then bent over the unconscious man, and, 
for the first time, kissed him on the cheek, and kissed the 
poor maimed hand that was nearest to her. Then she with- 
drew to the foot of the bed. 

Some two hours afterwards, Mortimer Lightwood saw his 
consciousness come back, and instantly, but very tranquilly, 
bent over him. 

“ Don’t speak, Eugene. Do no more than look at me, and 
listen to me. Y ou follow what I say . ” 

He moved his head in assent. 

“ I am going on from the point where we broke off. Is the 
word we should soon have come to — is it — Wife ? ” 

“ 0 Grod bless you, Mortimer ! ” 

“ Hush ! Don’t be agitated. Don’t speak. Hear me, dear 
Eugene. Your mind will be more at peace, lying here, if 
you make Lizzie your wife. Y ou wish me to speak to her, 
and tell her so, and entreat her to be your wife. Y ou ask her 
to kneel at this bedside and be married to you, that your rep- 
aration may be complete. Is that so ? ” 

“Yes. God bless you! Yes.” 

“ It shall be done, Eugene. Trust it to me. I shall have 
to go away for some few hours, to give effect to your wishes. 
You see this is unavoidable ? ” 

“ Touch my face with yours, in case I should not hold out 
till you come back. I love you, Mortimer. Don’t be uneasy 
for me while you are gone. If my dear brave girl will take 
me, I feel persuaded that I shall live long enough to be mar- 
ried, dear fellow.” 

Mortimer Lightwood was soon gone. As the evening 
light lengthened the heavy reflections of the trees in the riv- 
er, another figure came with a soft step into the sick-room. 

“ Is he conscious ? ” asked the little dressmaker, as the fig- 
ure took its station by the pillow. For J enny had given 
place to it immediately, and could not see the sufferer’s face. 

“ He is conscious, Jenny,” murmured Eugene for himself. 
“He knows his wife. ’ ’ 


318 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


CHAPTER LITI. 

*\ /rRS. JOHH RO.KESMITH sat at needlework in her 
ItX neat little room, beside a basket of neat little articles 
of clothing, which presented so much of the appearance of 
being in the dolls’ dressmaker’s way of business, that one 
might have supposed she was going to set up in opposition to 
Miss Wren. 

It was near John’s time for coming home, but as Mrs. 
John was desirous to finish a special triumph of her skill be- 
fore dinner, she did not go out to meet him. 

A knock at the door, and a ring at the bell. Hot John ; or 
Bella wmuld have flown out to meet him. Then who, if not 
J ohn ? Bella was asking herself the question, when that 
fluttering little fool of a servant fluttered in, saying, “ Mr. 
Lightwood! ” 

Bella had but time to throw a handkerchief over the bas- 
ket, when Mr. Lightwood made his bow. There was some- 
thing amiss with Mr. Lightwood, for he was strangely grave 
and looked ill. 

With a brief reference to the happy time when it had been 
his privilege to know Mrs. Rokesmith as Miss Wilfer, Mr. 
Lightwood explained what was amiss with him and why he 
came. He came bearing Lizzie Hexam’s earnest hope that 
Mrs. John Rokesmith would see her married. 

Bella was so fluttered by the request, and by the short 
narrative he had feelingly given her, that there never was a 
more timely smelling-bottle than John’s knock. “ My hus- 
band,” said Bella ; “ I’ll bring him in.” 

But that turned out to be more easily said than done : for, 
the instant she mentioned Mr. Lightwood’s name, John 
stopped, with his hand upon the lock of the room door. 

“ Come up-stairs, my darling.” 

Bella was amazed by the flush in his face, and by his sud- 
den turning away. “ What can it mean ? ” she thought, as 
she accompanied him up-stairs. 

“ You will come to this marriage with me, John dear ? ” 

“H — no, my love; I can’t do that.” 

You can’ t do that, J ohn ? ’ ’ 

‘‘No, my dear, it’s quite out of the question. Not tc be 
thought of.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND 


313 


Am I to go alone, J ohn ? ” 

“ No, my dear, you will go with Mr. Lightwood.’’ 

“ Don’t you think it’s time we went down to Mr. Light- 
wood, John dear ? ” Bella insinuated. 

“ My darling, it’s almost time you went, but I must ask 
you to excuse me to him altogether.” 

“ You never mean, John dear, that you are not going to 
see him ? He knows you have come home. I told him so.” 

That’s a little unfortunate, but it can’t be helped. Un- 
fortunate or fortunate, I positively cannot see him, my love. 
Look at me. I want to speak to you. Don’t you remember 
that you asked me not to declare w^hat I thought of your 
higher qualities until you had been tried ? ” 

Y es, J ohn dear. And I fully meant it, and mean it.” 

“ The time will come, my darling — I am no prophet, but I 
say so, — when you will be tried. The time will come, I 
think, when you will undergo a trial through which you will 
never pass quite triumphantly for me, unless you can put 
perfect faith m me.” 

“ Then you may be sure of me, John dear, for I can put 
perfect faith in you, and I do, and I always, always will. So 
now. I’ll go down to, and go away with Mr. Lightwood.” 

Mr. Rokesmith goes with us ? ” he said, hesitating, with 
a look towards the door. 

Oh, I forgot ! ” replied Bella. His best compliments. 
His face is swollen to the size of two faces, and he is to go to 
bed directly, poor fellow, to wait for the doctor, who is com- 
ing to lance him.” 

^Ht is curious,” observed Lightwood, “that I have never 
yet seen Mr. Rokesmith, though we have been engaged in 
the same affairs.” 

“ Really ! ” said the unblushing Bella. 

“I begin to think,” observed Lightwood, “that I never 
shall see him.” 

“ These things happen so oddly sometimes,” said Bella, 
with a steady countenance, “ that there seems a kind of fa- 
tality in them. But I am quite ready, Mr. Lightwood.” 

They started directly, in a little carriage that Lightwood 
had brought with him from never-to-be-forgotten Grreen- 
wich; and from G-reenwich they started directly for Lon- 


320 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


don ; and in London they waited at a railway station until 
such time as the Eeverend Frank Milvey, and Margaretta 
his wife, with whom Mortimer Lightwood had been already 
in conference, should come and join them. 

A young man of reserved appearance, in a coat and waist- 
coat of black, and pantaloons of pepper and salt, came into 
the office of the station, from its interior, in an unsettled 
way, immediately after Lightwood had gone out to the 
train ; and he had been hurriedly reading the printed bills 
and notices on the wall. He had had a wandering interest 
in what was said among the people waiting there and pass- 
ing to and fro. Mr. Milvey spoke to him. 

I cannot recall your name,’' he said, “ but I remember to 
have seen you in your school.” 

‘‘ My name is Bradley Headstone, sir,” he replied, backing 
into a more retired place. 

“ I ought to have remembered it,” said Mr. Milvey, giving 
him his hand. “ I hope you are well ? A little overworked, 
I am afraid ? ” 

“ Yes, I am overAvorked just at present, sir. Might I beg 
leave to speak to you, outside, a moment ? ” 

“ By all means.” 

“ One of your ladies, sir, mentioned within my hearing a 
name that I am acquainted with. The name of the sister of 
an old pupil of mine. The name of Hexam. The name of 
Lizzie Hexam.” The break he set between his two last sen- 
tences was quite embarrassing to his hearer. 

“ Yes,” replied Mr. Milvey. “ We are going down to see 
her.” 

“ I gathered as much, sir. I hope there is nothing amiss 
with the sister of my old pupil ? I hope no bereavement has 
befallen her. I hope she is in no affliction ? Has lost no — 
relation? ” 

“ I am glad to tell you, Mr. Headstone, that the sister of 
your old pupil has not sustained any such loss. Y ou thought 
I might be going down to bury some one ? ” 

“ That may have been the connection of ideas, sir, Avith 
your clerical character, but I was not conscious of it. — Then 
you are not, sir ? ’' 

“ Ho. In fact,” said Mr. Milvey, ‘‘ since you are so inter- 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


321 


ested ill the sister of your old pupil, I may as well tell you 
that I am going down to marry her.” 

The schoolmaster started back. 

‘^Not to marry her, myself,” said Mr. Milvey, with a 
smile, “ because I have a wife already. To perform the mar- 
riage service at her wedding.” 

Bradley Headstone caught hold of a pillar. If Mr. Milvey 
knew an ashy face when he saw it, he saw it then. 

“ You are quite ill, Mr. Headstone ! ” 

“ It is not much, sir. It will pass over very soon. I am 
accustomed to be seized with giddiness. Don’t let me de- 
tain you, sir ; I stand in need of no assistance, I thank you. 
Much obliged by your sparing me these minutes of your 
time.” 

As Mr. Milvey, who had no more minutes to spare, made a 
suitable reply and turned back into the office, he observed 
the schoolmaster to lean against the pillar with his hat in his 
hand, and to pull at his neckcloth as if he were trying to tear 
it off. The Eeverend Frank accordingly directed the notice 
of one of the attendants to him, by saying : “ There is a per- 
son outside who seems to be really ill, and to require some 
help, though he says he does not.” 

Far on in the night, Eugene opened his eyes. “ How does 
the time go ? Has our Mortimer come back ? ” 

Light wood was there. ‘‘Yes, Eugene, and all is ready.” 

“ Dear boy ! we both thank you heartily. Lizzie, tell 
them how welcome they are, and that I would be eloquent 
if I could.” 

“There is no need,” said Mr. Milvey. “We know it. 
Are you better, Mr. Wray burn ? ” 

“ I am much happier,” said Eugene. 

Then they all stood around the bed, and Mr. Milvey, 
opening his book, began the service, and did his office with 
suitable simplicity. As the bridegroom could not move his 
hand, they touched his fingers with the ring, and so put it on 
the bride. When the two plighted their troth, she laid her 
hand on his, and kept it there. When the ceremony was 
done, and all the rest departed from the room, she drew her 
arm under his head, and laid her own head upon thopDlo'w 
by his side. 


322 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


^‘Undraw the curtains, my dear girl,” said Eugene, after a 
while, “ and let us see our wedding-day.” 

The sun was rising, and his first rays struck into the 
room, as she came back, and put her lips to his. “ I bless the 
day ! ” said Eugene. ‘‘ I bless the day ! ” said Lizzie. 

“ You have made apoor marriage of it, my sweet wife,” 
said Eugene. ‘‘A shattered graceless fellow, stretched at 
his length here, and next to nothing for you when you are a 
young widow.” 

I have made the marriage that I would have given all 
the world to dare to hope for,” she replied. 

Lizzie,” said Eugene, after a silence ; “ when you see me 
wandering away from this refuge that I have so ill deserved, 
speak to me by my name, and I think I shall come back.” 

“Yes, dear Eugene.” 

“ There ! ” he exclaimed, smiling. “ I should have gone 
then, but for that ! ” 

A little while afterwards, when he appeared to be sinking 
into insensibility, she said, in a calm loving voice : Eugene, 
my dear husband! ” He immediately answered: “There 
again I You see how you can recall me 1 ” And afterwards, 
when he could not speak, he still answered by a slight move- 
ment of his head upon her bosom. 


CHAPTER LIY. 


^ HE winds and tides rose and fell a certain number of 



I times, the earth moved round the sun a certain number 
of times, the ship upon the ocean made her voyage safely, 
and brought a baby Bella home. Then who so blest and 
happy as Mrs. John Rokesmith, saving and excepting Mr. 
J ohn Rokesmith 1 

She went up to London one day, to meet him, in order 
that they might make some purchases. She found him wait- 
ing for her at their journey’s end, and they walked away to- 
gether through the streets. He was in gay spirits, and they 
were chatting on the way, when they turned a corner, and 
met Mr. Lightwood. 

He stopped as if he were petrified by the sight of Bella’s 
husband, who in the same moment had changed color. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


323 


“ Mr. Liglitwood and I have met before.” 

“ Met before, John ? ” Bella repeated in a tone of wonder. 
“ Mr. Lightwood told me he had never seen you.” 

“ I did not then know that I had,” said Lightwood, dis- 
composed on her account. “ I believed that I had only 
heard of — Mr. Bokesmith.” With an emphasis on the name. 

“When Mr. Lightwood saw me, my love,” observed her 
husband, looking at him, “ my name was Julius Handford.” 

Julius Handford ! The name that Bella had so often seen 
in old newspapers, when she was an inmate of Mrs. Boffin’s 
house ! Julius Handford, who had been publicly entreated 
to appear, and for intelligence of whom a reward had been 
publicly offered ! 

“ I would have avoided mentioning it in your presence,” 
said Lightwood to Bella, delicately ; “ but since your hus- 
band mentions it himself, I must confirm his strange admis- 
sion. I saw him as Mr. Julius Handford, and I afterwards 
(unquestionably to his knowledge) took great pains to trace 
him out.” 

“ Quite true. But it was not my object or my interest,” 
said Bokesmith, quietly, “ to be traced out.” 

“ Sir,” returned Lightwood, with a meaning glance to- 
wards Bella, “ my position is a truly painful one. I hope 
that no complicity in a very dark transaction may attach to 
you, but you cannot fail to know that your own extraordi- 
nary conduct has laid you under suspicion.” 

“ Mr. Lightwood, I assure you I have no disposition to de- 
ny it, or intention to deny it. I am going straight home, and 
shall remain at home to-morrow until noon. Hereafter, I 
hope we may be better acquainted. Good-day.” 

Lightwood stood irresolute, but Bella’s husband passed 
him in the steadiest manner, with Bella on his arm. 

When they had dined and were alone, John Bokesmith 
said to his wife, who had preserved her cheerfulness : “ And 
you don’t ask me, my dear, why I bore that name ? ” 

“Ho, John love. I should dearly like to know, of 
course ; ” (which her anxious face confirmed ;) “ but I wait 
until you can tell me of your own free will. You asked me 
if I could have perfect faith in you, and I said yes, and I 
meant it.” 


324 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


It did not escape Bella’s notice that he began to look tri- 
umphant. “You heard Mr. Lightwood speak of a dark 
transaction ? ” 

“ Yes, John.” 

“ You are prepared to hear explicitly what he meant ? ” 
“Yes, John.” 

“ My life, he meant the murder of John Harmon, your al- 
lotted husband.” 

With a fast palpitating heart, Bella grasped him by the 
arm. “ You cannot be suspected, J ohn ? ” 

“ Dear love, I can be — for I am ! ” 

There was a silence between them, as she sat looking in 
his face, with the color quite gone from her own face and 
lips. “ How dare they ! ” she cried at length. “ My be- 
loved husband, how dare they ! ” 

He caught her in his arms as she opened hers, and held her 
to his heart. “ Even knowing this, you can trust me, Bella ? ” 
“ I can trust you, J ohn dear, with all my soul. If I could 
not trust you, I should fall dead at your feet.” 

A twilight calm of happiness then succeeding to their ra- 
diant noon, they remained at peace, until a strange voice in 
the room startled them both. The room being by that time 
dark, the voice said, “ Don’t let the lady be alarmed by my 
striking a light,” and immediately a match rattled, and glim- 
mered in a hand. The hand and the match and the voice 
were then seen by John Rokesmith to belong to Mr. Inspect- 
or, once meditatively active in this chronicle. 

“ I take the liberty,” said Mr. Inspector, in a business-like 
manner, “to bring myself to the recollection of Mr. Julius 
Handford, who gave me his name and address down at our 
place a considerable time ago. W ould the lady object to my 
lighting the pair of candles on the chimney-piece, to throw a 
further light upon the subject ? No ? Thank you, ma’am. 
Now we look cheerful. Y ou favored me, Mr. Handford, by 
writing down your name and address, and I produce the 
piece of paper on which you wrote it. Comparing the same 
with the writing on the fly-leaf of this book on the table — 
and a sweet pretty volume it is — I find the writing of the 
entry, ‘Mrs. John Rokesmith. From her husband on her 
birthday ’ — and very gratifying to the feelings such memori- 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


325 


als are — to correspond exactly. Can I have a word with 
you? ” 

Certainly. Here, if you please,” was the reply. 

“ Why,” retorted Mr. Inspector, “ though there’s nothing 
for the lady to be at all alarmed at, still, ladies are apt to take 
alarm at matters of business ; if the lady was to step up- 
stairs, and take a look at baby now ! ” 

‘^Mrs. Rokesmith,” said her husband, is satisfied that 
she can have no reason for being alarmed, whatever the bus- 
iness is. Do you propose to take me into custody ? ” 

“ I propose that you shall come along with me.” 

For what reason ? ” 

“ Lord bless my soul and body ! ” returned Mr. Inspector, 
I wonder at it in a man of your education. Why argue ? ” 

‘‘ What do you charge against me ? ” 

^‘I wonder at you before a lady,” said Mr. Inspector, 
shaking his head reproachfully : “ I wonder, brought up as 
you have been, you haven’t a more delicate mind ? I charge 
you, then, with being some way concerned in the Harmon 
Murder.” 

“You don’t surprise me. I foresaw your visit this after- 
noon.” 

“ Don’t ? ” said Mr. Inspector. “ Why, why argue ? It’s 
my duty to inform you that whatever you say, will be used 
against you.” 

“I don’t think it will.” 

“ But I tell you it will,” said Mr. Inspector. “ Kow, hav- 
ing received the caution, do you still say that you foresaw 
my visit this afternoon ? ” 

“ Yes. And I will say something more, if you will step 
» with me into the next room.” 

With a reassuring kiss on the lips of the frightened Bella, 
her husband (to whom Mr. Inspector obligingly offered his 
arm), took up a candle, and withdrew with that gentleman. 
They were a full half-hour in conference. When they re- 
turned, Mr. Inspector looked considerably astonished ; but 
John was triumphant; that much was made apparent; and 
she could wait for the rest. 

When John came home to dinner next day, he said, sit- 


326 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


ting down on the sofa by. Bella and baby-Bella : “ My dear, I 
have a piece of news to tell you. I have left the China 
House. I am in another way of business. And I am rather 
better off.” 

The inexhaustible baby was instantly made to congratu- 
late him, and to say, with appropriate action on the part of 
a very limp arm and a speckled fist, “ Three cheers, ladies 
and gemple-morums. Hoo — ray ! ” 

“ I am afraid, my life,” said J ohn, “ that you have become 
very much attached to this cottage ? ” 

“ Afraid I have, John ? Of course I have.” 

“ The reason why I said afraid,” returned John, “is, be- 
cause we must move.” 

“O John!” 

“Yes, my dear, we must move. W e must have our head- 
quarters in London now. In short, there’s a dwelling rent- 
free, attached to my new position, and we must occupy it.” 

“ That’s a gain, John.” 

“Yes, my dear, it is undoubtedly a gain.” 

He gave her a very blithe look, and a very sly look. 
Which occasioned the inexhaustible baby to square at him 
with the speckled fists, and demand in a threatening manner 
what he meant ? 

“But really, John dear,” said Bella, flushed in quite a 
lovely manner, “ will the ne\Y house, just as it stands, do for 
baby? That’s the question.” 

“ I felt that to be the question,” he returned, “ and there- 
fore I arranged that you should come with me and look at it, 
to-morrow morning.” Appointment made, accordingly, for 
Bella to go up with him to-morrow morning ; J ohn kissed ; 
and Bella delighted. 

When they reached London in pursuance of their little 
plan, they took coach and drove westward. Hot only drove 
westward, but drove into that particular westward division 
which Bella had seen last when she turned her face from Mr. 
Boffin’s door. Hot only drove into that particular division, 
but drove at last into that very street. Hot only drove into 
that very street, but stopped at last at that very house. 

“John dear! ” cried Bella, looking out of window in a 
flutter. “ Do you see where we are ? ” 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


327 


“ Yes, my love. The coachman’s quite right.” 

The house-door was opened without any knocking or 
ringing, and John promptly helped her out. The servant 
who stood holding the door, asked no question of John, 
neither did he go before them or follow them as they went 
straight up-stairs. It was only her husband’s encircling 
arm, urging her on, that prevented Bella from stopping at 
the foot of the staircase. As they ascended, it Avas seen to 
be tastefully ornamented with most beautiful flowers. 

“ 0 John ! ” said Bella, faintly. What does this mean ? ” 

“ Nothing, my darling, nothing. Let us go on.” 

Going on a little higher, they came to a charming aviary, 
in which tropical birds, more gorgeous in color than the 
flowers, were flying about; and among those birds were 
gold and silver fish, and mosses, and water-lilies, and a foun- 
tain, and all manner of wonders. 

^‘0 my dear John!” said Bella. ‘‘What does this 
mean ? ” 

“ Nothing, my darling, nothing. Let us go on.” 

They Aven ton, until they came to a door. As John put 
out his hand to open it, Bella caught his hand. 

“ I don’t know Avhat it means, but it’s too much for me. 
Hold me, John, love.” 

John caught her up in his arms, and lightly dashed into the 
room with her. 

Behold Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, beaming I Behold Mrs. Bof- 
fin clapping her hands in an ecstasy, running to Bella with 
tears of joy pouring down her comely face, and folding her 
to her breast, with the words : “ My deary, deary, deary 
girl, that Noddy and me saw married and couldn’t wish joy 
to, or so much as speak to 1 My deary, deary, deary, wife of 
John and mother of his little child! My loving loving, 
bright bright. Pretty Pretty ! Welcome to your house and 
home, my deary I ” 


CHAPTER LY. 

I N all the first bewilderment of her wonder, the most be- 
wilderingly w'onderful thing to Bella was the shining 
countenance of Mr. Boffin. But, that he, with a perfectly 


328 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


beneficent air and a plump rosy face, should be standing 
there, looking at her and John, like some jovial good spirit, 
was marvelous. 

Mrs. Boffin seated Bella on the large ottoman, and seated 
herself beside her, and John her husband seated himself on 
the other side of her, and Mr. Boffin stood beaming at every 
one and every thing he could see, with surpassing jollity and 
enjoyment. 

“ Old lady, old lady,” said Mr. Boffin, “ if you don’t begin 
somebody else must.” 

“I’m a-going to begin, Noddy, my dear,” returned Mrs. 
Boffin. “ Only it isn’t easy for a person to know where to 
begin, when a person is in this state of delight and happi- 
ness. Bella, my dear. Tell me, who’s this ? ” 

“ Who is this ? ” repeated Bella. “ My husband.” 

“ Ah ! But tell me his name, deary ! ” cried Mrs. Boffin. 

“ Bokesmith.” 

“ No, it ain’t ! ” cried Mrs. Boffin, clapping her hands and 
shaking her head. “ Not a bit of it ! ” 

“ Handford, then,” suggested Bella. 

“No, it ain’t!” cried Mrs. Boffin, again clapping her 
hands, and shaking her head. “Not a bit of it.” 

“ At least his name is John, I suppose ? ” said Bella. 

“ Ah 1 I should think so, deary I ” cried Mrs. Boffin. “ I 
should hope so I Many and many is the time. I have called 
himby his name of John. But what’s his other name, his 
true other name ? Give a guess, my pretty 1 ” 

“ I can’t guess,” said Bella, turning her pale face from one 
to another. 

“ I could,” cried Mrs. Boffin, “ and what’s more, I did I I 
found him out, aU in a flash as I may say, one night. Didn’t 
I Noddy ? ” 

“Ay 1 That the old lady did 1 ” said Mr. Boffin. 

“ Harkee to me, deary,” pursued Mrs. Boffin, taking Bel- 
la’s hands between her own, and gently beating on them 
from time to time. “ It was after a particular night when 
John had been disappointed — as he thought — in his affec- 
tions. It was after a night when John had made an offer to 
^ a certain young lady, and the certain young lady had refused 
it. 1 1 was after a particular night, when he felt himself cast - 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


329 


away-like, and had made up his mind to go seek his fortune. 
It was the very next night. My Noddy wanted a paper out 
of his Secretary’s room, and I says to Noddy, ‘ I am going 
by the door, and I’ll ask him for it.’ I tapped at his door, 
and he didn’t hear me. I looked in, and saw him a-sitting 
lonely by his fire, brooding over it. He chanced to look up 
with a pleased kind of smile in my company when he saw 
me, and then in a single moment every grain of the gunpow- 
der that had been lying sprinkled thick about him ever since 
I first set eyes upon him as a man at the Bower, took fire! 
Too many a time had I seen him sitting lonely, when he was 
a poor child, to be pitied, heart and hand 1 Too many a time 
had I seen him in need of being brightened up with a com- 
forting word ! Too many and too many a time to be mistak- 
en, when that glimpse of him come at last 1 N o, no ! I just 
makes out to cry, H know you now! You’re John!’ 
And he catches me as I drops. — So what,” said Mrs. Boffin, 
breaking off in the rush of her speech to smile most radiant- 
ly, “ might you think by this time that your husband’s name 
was, dear ? ” 

“Not,” returned Bella, with quivering lips: “not Har- 
mon ? That’s not possible ? ” ^ 

“ Don’t tremble. Why not possible, deary, when so 
many things are possible ? ” demanded Mrs. Boffin, in a 
soothing tone. 

“ He was killed,” gasped Bella. 

“ Thought to be,” said Mrs. Boffin. “But if ever John 
Harmon drew the breath of life on earth, that is certainly 
John Harmon’s arm round your waist now, my pretty. If 
ever John Harmon had a wife on earth, that wife is certainly 
you. If ever John Harmon and his wife had a child on 
earth, that child is certainly this.” 

By a master-stroke of secret arrangement, the inexhaust- 
ible baby here appeared at the door, suspended in mid-air by 
invisible agency. Mrs. Boffin, plunging at it, brought it to 
Bella’s lap, where both Mrs. and Mr. Boffin (as the saying is) 
“ took it out of ” the Inexhaustible in a shower of caresses. 
It was only this timely appearance that kept Bella from 
swooning. 

“But bless ye, my beauty!” cried Mrs. Boffin, with 


330 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


another hearty clap of her hands. “It wasn’t John only 
that was in it. We was all on us in it.” 

“ I don’t,” said Bella, looking vacantly from one to anoth- 
er, “ yet understand — ” 

“ Of course you don’t, my deary,” exclaimed Mrs. Boffin. 
“ How can you till you’re told ? When I cries out that night, 
‘I know you now! you’re John 1 ’ John catches me, it is 
true; but I ain’t alight weight, bless ye, and he’s forced to 
let me down. ISToddy, he hears a noise, and in he trots, and 
as soon as I anyways comes to myself I calls to him, ^ Nod- 
dy, well I might say as I did say, that night at the Bower, for 
the Lord be thankful this is J ohn 1 ’ On which he gives a 
heave, and down he goes likewise, with his head under the 
writing-table. This brings me round comfortable, and that 
brings him round comfortable, and then John and him and 
me we all fall a-crying for joy. J ohn, he tells us how he is 
despairing in his mind on accounts of a certain fair young 
person, and how, if I hadn’t found him out, he was going 
away to seek his fortune far and wide, and had fully meant 
never to come to life, but to leave the property as our wrong- 
ful inheritance for ever and a day. At which you never see 
a jpan so frightened as my Noddy was. For to think that 
he should have come into the property wrongful, however 
innocent, and — more than that — might have gone on keep- 
ing it to his dying day, turned him whiter than chalk. N od- 
dy gives it as his opinion that the certain fair young person 
is a deary creetur. ‘ She may be a little spoilt, and nat’rally 
spoilt,’ he says, ‘ by circumstances, but that’s only on the sui- 
face, and I lay my life,’ he says, ‘ that she’s the true golden 
gold at heart.’ Then says J ohn, 0, if he could but prove so ! 
Then we both of us ups and says, that minute, ‘ Prove so I ’ 
Then we says, ‘ What will content you ? If she was to 
stand up for you when you was slighted, if she was to show 
herself of a generous mind when you was oppressed, if she 
was to be truest to you when you was poorest and friend- 
lessest, and all this against her own seeming interest, how 
would that do ? ’ ‘ Do ? ’ says John, ‘ it would raise me to 

the skies.’ ^ Then,’ says my Noddy, ‘make your prepara- 
tions for the ascent, John, it being my firm belief that up 
yougol’ 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


331 


Well! Then says my Noddy, shaking his sides till he 
was fit to make ’em ache again : ‘ Look out for being slighted 
and oppressed, John, for if ever a man had a hard master, 
you shall find me from this present time to be such to you.’ 
And then he began! ” cried Mrs. Boffin, in an ecstasy of 
admiration. “ Lord bless you, then he began ! And how 
he did begin ; didn’t he ! But, bless you, if you could have 
seen him of a night, at that time of it ! The way he’d sit and 
chuckle over himself ! The way he’d say, ‘ I’ve been a reg- 
ular brown bear to-day,’ and take himself in his arms and 
hug himself at the thoughts of the brute he had pretended. 
But every night he says to me : ‘ Better and better, old lady. 
What did we say of her ? She’ll come through it, the true 
golden gold. This’ll be the happiest piece of work we ever 
done.’ And then he’d say, ‘ I’ll be a grislier old growler to- 
morrow ! ’ and laugh, he would, till John and me was often 
forced to slap his back, and bring it out of his windpipes with 
a little water. 

“ And so my good and pretty,” pursued Mrs. Boffin, “ you 
was married, and there was we hid up in the church-organ 
by this husband of yours ; for he wouldn’t let us out with it 
then, as was first meant. ^No,’ he says, ^ she’s so unselfish 
and contented, that I can’t afford to be rich yet. I must wait 
a little longer.’ Then, when baby was expected, he says, 
‘ She is such a cheerful, glorious housewife that I can’t afford 
to be rich yet. I must wait a little longer.’ Then when ba- 
by was born, he says, ‘ She is so much better than she ever 
was, that I can’t afford to be rich yet. I must wait a little 
longer.’ And so he goes on and on, till I says outright, 
‘ Now, J ohn, if you don’t fix a time for setting her up in her 
own house and home, and letting us walk out of it. I’ll turn 
Informer. Then he says he’ll only wait to triumph beyond 
what we ever thought possible, and to shoAv her to us better 
than even we ever supposed ; and he says, ^ She shall see me 
under suspicion of having murdered myself, and you shall 
see how trusting and how true she’ll be.’ Well! Noddy 
and me agreed to that, and he was right, and here you are, 
and the horses is in, and the story is done, and God bless you 
my Beauty, and God bless us all ! ” 

Bella and Mrs. Boffin took a good long hug of one anoth- 


332 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


er, to the apparent peril of the inexhaustible baby, lying 
staring in Bella’s lap. 

“But is the story done?” said Bella, pondering. “Is 
there no more of it ? ” 

She looked hard at Mr. Boffin, who had moved to a table 
where he was leaning his head upon his hand with his face 
turned away, and, quietly settling herself on her knees at 
his side, and drawing one arm over his shoulder, said : 
“ Please I beg your pardon, and I made a small mistake of a 
word when I took leave of you last. Please I think you are 
better (not worse) than Hopkins, better (not worse) than 
Dancer, better (not worse) than Blackberry Jones, better 
(not worse) than any of them ! Please something more ! ” 
cried Bella, with an exultant ringing laugh as she struggled 
with him and forced him to turn his delighted face to hers. 
“ Please I have found out something not yet mentioned. 
Please I don’t believe you are a hard-hearted miser at all, 
and please I don’t believe you ever for one single minute 
were! ” 

At this, Mrs. Boffin fairly screamed with rapture, and sat 
beating her feet upon the floor, clapping her hands, and bob- 
bing herself backwards and forwards, like a demented mem- 
ber of some Mandarin’s family. 

“ Still,” said Bella, after a meditative pause, “ Mrs. Boffin 
never supposed any part of the change in Mr. Boffin to be 
real; did she? — You never did; did you?” 

“ Ho 1 ” returned Mrs. Boffin. 

“ And yet you took it very much to heart,” said Bella. 

“ Ecod, you see Mrs. John has a sharp eye, John ! ” cried 
Mr. Boffin, shaking his head with an admiring air. “ You’re 
right, my dear. The old lady nearly blowed us into shivers 
and smithers, many times.” 

“Why?” asked Bella. “"How did that happen, when 
she was in your secret ? ” 

“ Why, it was a weakness in the old lady,” said Mr. Bof- 
fin; “ and yet, to tell you the whole truth and nothing but 
the truth, I’m rather proud of it. My dear, the old lady 
thinks so high of me that she couldn’t abear to see and hear 
^ me coming out as a reg’lar brown one. Couldn’t abear to 
make believe as I meant it 1 I assure you, my dear, that on 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


333 


the celebrated day when I made what has since been agreed 
upon to be my grandest demonstration — I allude to Mew 
says the cat, Quack quack says the duck, and Bow-wow- 
wow says the dog, them flinty and unbelieving words hit 
my old lady so hard on my account, that I had to hold her, to 
prevent her running out after you, and defending me by say- 
ing I was playing a part.” 

Mrs. Boffin laughed heartily again, and her eyes glistened 
again, and it then appeared, not only that in that burst of 
sarcastic eloquence Mr. Boffin was considered by his two 
fellow-conspirators to have outdone himself, but that in his 
own opinion it was a remarkable achievement. ‘‘Never 
thought of it afore the moment, my dear ! ” he observed to 
Bella. “ When John said, if he had been so happy as to win 
your affections and possess your heart, it come into my head 
to turn round upon him with ‘ Win her affections and pos- 
sess her heart ! Mew says the cat, Quack quack says the 
duck, and Bow-wow-wow says the dog.' I couldn’t tell 
you how it come into my head or where from, but it had so 
much the sound of a rasper that I own to you it astonished 
myself. I was awful nigh bursting out a-laughing though, 
when it made John stare ! ” 

Then Mrs. J ohn Harmon went about to see her house. 
And a dainty house it was, and a tastefully beautiful ; and 
they went through it in procession ; the inexhaustible on 
Mrs. Boffin’s bosom (still staring) occupying the middle sta- 
tion, and Mr. Boffin bringing up the rear. And on Bella’s 
exquisite toilet table was an ivory casket, and in the casket 
were jewels the like of which she had never dreamed of, and 
aloft on an upper floor was a nursery garnished as with rain- 
bows ; “ though we were hard put to it,” said John Harmon, 
“ to get it done in so short a time,” 

CHAPTER LYI. 

M r. and MRS. JOHN HARMON had so timed their 
taking possession of their rightful name and their 
London house, that the event befell on the very day when 
the last wagon-load of the last Mound was driven out at the 
gates of Boffin’s Bower. As it jolted away, Mr. Wegg felt 


334 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


that the last load was correspondingly removed from his 
mind, and hailed the auspicious season when that black 
sheep, Boffin, was to be closely sheared. 

A foreman-representative of the dust contractors, pur- 
chasers of the Mounds, had wmrn Mr. Wegg down to skin 
and bone. This supervisor of the proceedings, asserting his 
employers’ rights to cart off by daylight, nightlight, torch- 
light, when they would, must have been the death of Silas if 
the work had lasted much longer. Seeming never to need 
sleep himself, he would reappear, with a tied-up broken 
head, in fantail hat and velveteen smalls, like an accursed 
goblin, at the most unholy and untimely hours. Tired out 
by keeping close ward over a long day’s work in fog and 
rain, Silas would have just crawled to bed and be dozing, 
when a horrid shake and rumble under his pillow would an- 
nounce an approaching train of carts, escorted by this De- 
mon of Unrest, to fall to work again. At another time, he 
would be rumbled up out of his soundest sleep, in the dead 
of night ; at another, would be kept at his post eight-and- 
forty hours on end. 

To Mr. Venus’s museum Mr. Wegg repaired when at 
length the Mounds w^ere down and gone. It^Deing evening, 
he found that gentleman seated over his fire. 

“ Why, you smell rather comfortable here ! ” said Wegg, 
seeming to take it ill, and stopping and sniffing as he entered. 

I am rather comfortable, sir ! ” said Venus. 

“And you’ve been having your hair cut! ” said Wegg, 
missing the usual dusty shock. 

“Yes, Mr. Wegg.” 

“ And I am blessed if you ain’t getting fat I ” said Wegg, 
with culminating discontent. “ What are you going to do 
next? ” 

“Well, Mr. Wegg,” said Venus, “I suspect you could 
hardly guess what I am going to do next.” 

“ I don’t want to guess,” retorted Wegg. All I’ve got 
to say is, that it’s well for you that the diwision of labor has 
been what it has been. Why, you’ ve been having the place 
cleaned up I” 

„ “ Yes, Mr. Wegg. By the hand of adorable woman.” 

“ Then what you’re going to do next, I suppose, is to get 
married ? ” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


335 


“That’s it, sir.” 

“ To the old party ? ” 

“ Mr. W egg ! The lad}^ in question is not a old party.” 

“ I meant,” explained Wegg, testily, “ to the party as for- 
merly objected ? ” 

“ Mr. Wegg,” said Yenus, “ in a case of so much delicacy, 
I must trouble you to say what you mean. There are strings 
that must not be played upon. No sir! Not sounded, unless 
in the most respectful and tuneful manner. Of such melodi- 
ous strings is Miss Pleasant Riderhood formed.” 

“ Then it is the lady as formerly objected ? ” said Y^egg. 

“ Sir,” returned Yenus with dignity. “ I accept the alter- 
ed phrase. It is the lady as formerly obj ected. ’ ’ 

“However, Mr. Yenus,” said Wegg, after eyeing him 
with a touch of distrust, “ I wish you joy. One man spends 
his fortune in one way, and another in another. You are 
going to try matrimony. I mean to try travehng.” 

“ Indeed, Mr. Wegg ? ” 

“ Change of air, sea-scenery, and my natural rest, I hope 
may bring me round after the persecutions I have under- 
gone from the dustman with his head tied up, which I just 
now mentioned. The tough job being ended and the 
Mounds laid low, the hour is come for Boffin to stump up. 
Would ten to-morrow morning suit you, partner, for finally 
bringing Boffin’s nose to the grindstone ? ” 

Ten to-morrow morning would quite suit Mr. Yenus for 
that excellent purpose. 

Yenus was punctual, and Wegg undertook to knock at 
the door, and conduct the conference. Door knocked at. 
Door opened. 

“Boffin at home? ” 

The servant replied that Mr. Boffin was at home. 

“ He’ll do,” said Wegg, “ though it ain’t what I call him.” 

The servant inquired if they had any appointment. 

“Now, I tell you what, young fellow,” said Wegg, “I 
won’t have it. This won’t do for me. I don’t want menials. 
I want Boffin.” 

They were shown into a waiting-room, where the all- 
powerful AVegg wore his hat, and wdiistled, and with his 


336 


COJSfDEJS'SED CLASSICS. 


forefinger stirred up a clock that stood upon the chimney- 
piece, until he made it strike. In a few minutes they were 
shown up-stairs into what used to be Bofiin’s room ; which, 
besides the door of entrance, had folding-doors in it, to make 
it one of a suite of rooms when occasion required. Here 
Boffin was seated at a library-table, and here Mr. Wegg, 
having imperiously motioned the servant to withdraw, drew 
up a chair and seated himself, in his hat, close beside him. 
Mr. Wegg instantly underwent the remarkable experience 
of having his hat twitched off his head and thrown out of a 
window, which was opened and shut for the purpose. 

“ Be careful what insolent liberties you take in that gen- 
tleman’s presence,” said the owner of the hand which had 
done this, “ or I’ll throw you after it.” 

Wegg involuntarily clapped his hand to his bare head, 
and stared at the Secretary. For it was he who addressed 
him with a severe countenance, and wdio had come in quiet- 
ly by the folding- doors. 

Oh ! ” said Wegg, as soon as he recovered his suspended 
power of speech. V ery good ! I gave directions for you 
to be dismissed. And you ain’t gone, ain’t you? Oh I 
W e’U look into this presently. V ery good ! ” 

“Ho, nor I ain’t gone,” said another voice. 

Somebody else had come in quietly by the folding-doors. 
Turning his head, Wegg beheld his persecutor, the ever- 
wakeful dustman, accoutred with fan tail hat and velveteen 
smalls complete. Who, untying his broken head, revealed 
a head that was whole, and a face that was Sloppy’s. 

“ Ha, ha, ha, gentlemen ! ” roared Sloppy in a peal of 
laughter, and wdth immeasurable relish. “ He never thought 
as I could sleep standing, and often done it when I turned 
for Mrs. Higden ! He never thought as I used to give Mrs. 
Higden the Police-news in different voices ! But I did lead 
him a life all through it, gentlemen, I hope I really and truly 
DID ! ” Here Mr. Sloppy, opening his mouth to a quite 
alarming extent, and throwing back his head to peal again, 
revealed incalculable buttons. 

“ Oh ! ” said Wegg, slightly discomfited, but not much as 
yet; one and one is two not dismissed, is it ? • Bof — fin! 
I want the room cleared of these two scum.” 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEKD. 


337 


That’s not going to be done, Wegg,” replied Mr. Boffin. 

^^Bof — fin! Not going to be done?” repeated Wegg. 
“ Not at your peril ? ” 

“ No, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin, shaking his head good-hu- 
moredly. “ Not at my peril, and not on any other terms.” 

Wegg reflected a moment, and then said: “Mr. Yenus, 
will you be so good as to hand me over that same docky- 
ment ? ” 

“Certainly, sir,” replied Yenus, handing it to him with 
much politeness. “ There it is. Having now, sir, parted 
with it, I wish to make a small observation ; Silas Wegg, you 
precious old rascal, I took the liberty of taking Mr. Boffin in- 
to our concern as a sleeping partner, at a very early period of 
our firm’s existence.” 

“ Quite true,” added Mr. Boffin ; “ and I tested Yenus by 
making him a pretended proposal or two ; and I found him 
on the whole a very honest man, Wegg.” 

“ Thank you, sir,” said Yenus, “ I am much obliged to you, 
sir, for all. For your good opinion now, for your way of re- 
ceiving and encouraging me when I first put myself in com- 
munication with you, and for the influence since so kindly 
brought to bear upon a certain lady, both by yourself and by 
Mr. J ohn Harmon.” 

Wegg followed the name with sharp ears, and the action 
with sharp eyes, and a certain cringing air was infusing itself 
into his bullying air, when his attention was reclaimed by 
Y enus. 

“ Everything else between you and me, Mr. Wegg,” said 
Yenus, “ now explains itself, and you can now make out, sir, 
without further words from me.” 

“ You are a fool,” said Wegg, with a snap of his fingei'vS, 
“ and I’d have got rid of you before now, if I could have 
struck out any way of doing it. You may go, and welcome. 
You leave the more for me. Because, you know,” said 
Wegg, dividing his next observation between Mr. Boffin 
and Mr. Harmon, “ I am worth my price, and I mean to 
have it. I am here to be bought off, and I have named my 
figure. Now, buy me, or leave me.” 

“ I’ll leave you, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin, laughing, “ as far 
as I am concerned.” 

22 


338 


COJVDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Bof — fin ! ” replied "Wegg, turning upon him with a se- 
vere air, “ I understand your new-born boldness. But Mr. 
Harmon is in another sitiwation. What Mr. Harmon risks, 
is quite another pair of shoes. Now, I’ve heerd something 
lately about this being Mr. Harmon, and I drop you, Bof — 
fin, as beneath my notice. I ask Mr. Harmon whether he 
has any idea of the contents of this present paper ? ” 

It is a will of my late father’s, of more recent date than 
the will proved by Mr. Boffin (address whom again, as 
you have addressed him already, and I’ll knock you down), 
leaving the whole of his property to the Crown,” said John 
Harmon, with as much indiflerence as was compatible with 
extreme sternness. 

“ Bight you are ! ” cried Wegg. Then, I put the ques- 
tion to you, wdiat’s this paper worth ? ” 

‘‘ Nothing,” said John Harmon. 

Wegg had repeated the v/ord with a sneer, and was enter- 
ing on some sarcastic retort, wffien, to his boundless amaze- 
ment, he found himself gripped by the cravat ; shaken until 
his teeth chattered ; shoved back, staggering, into a corner of 
the room ; and pinned there. 

“You scoundrel! ” said John Harmon, whose seafaring 
hold was like that of a vise. 

“ You’re knocking my head against the wall,” urged Silas 
faintly. 

“I’d give a thousand pounds for leave to knock your 
brains out. Listen, you scoundrel, and look at that Dutch 
bottle.” 

Sloppy held it up, for his edification. 

“ That Dutch bottle, scoundrel, contained the latest will of 
the many wills made by my unhappy seK-tormenting father. 
That will gives everything absolutely to my noble benefac- 
tor and yours, Mr. Boffin, excluding and reviling me, and my 
sister (then already dead of a broken heart), by name. That 
Dutch bottle wa.s found by my noble benefactor and yours, 
after he entered on possession of the estate. That Dutch 
bottle distressed him beyond measure, because, though I and 
my sister were both no more, it cast a slur upon our memory 
which he knew we had done nothing in our miserable youth 
to deserve. That Dutch bottle, therefore, he buried in the 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


339 


Mound belonging to him, and there it lay while you, you 
thankless wretch, were prodding and poking — often very 
near it, I dare say. His intention was, that it should never 
see the light ; but he was afraid to destroy it, lest to destroy 
such a document, even with his great generous motive, might 
be an ofiense at law. After the discovery was made here 
who I was, Mr. Boffin told me, upon certain conditions im- 
possible for such a hound as you to appreciate, the secret of 
that Dutch bottle. I urged upon him the necessity of its be- 
ing dug up, and the paper being legally produced and estab- 
lished. The first thing you saw him do, and the second thing 
has been done without your knowledge. Consequently, 
the paper now rattling in your hand as I shake you — and I 
should like to shake the life out of you — is worth less than 
the rotten cork of the Dutch bottle, do you understand ? ” 

Judging from the fallen countenance of Silas as his head 
wagged backwards and forwards in a most uncomfortable 
manner, he did understand. 

Here John Harmon assisted his comprehension with an- 
other shake. 

“ How, scoundrel,” he pursued, you supposed me, just 
now, to be the possessor of my father’s property. — So I am. 
But through any act of my father’s, or by any right I have ? 
Ho! Through the munificence of Mr Boffin. The condi- 
tions that he made with me, before parting with the secret 
of the Dutch bottle, were that I should take the fortune, 
and that he should take his Mound and no more. I owe 
everything I possess, solely to the disinterestedness, up- 
rightness, tenderness, goodness (there are no words to satis- 
fy me) of Mr. and Mrs. Boffin. And when, knowing what 
I knew, I saw such a mud-worm as you presume to rise in 
this house against this noble soul, the wonder is,” added 
J ohn Harmon, through his clenched teeth, and with a very 
ugly turn indeed on Wegg’s cravat, “ that I didn’t try to 
twist your head off, and fling that out of window I So. 
Do you understand ? ” 

“I am sorry, Wegg,” said Mr. Boffin, in his clemency, 
“ that my old lady and I can’t have a better opinion of you 
than the bad one we are forced to entertain. But I 
shouldn’t like to leave you, after all said and done, worse off 


340 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


in life than I found you. Therefore say in a word, before 
we part, what it’ll cost to set you up in another stall. 
Here’s a couple of pound.” 

“ Injustice to myself, I couldn’t take it, sir.” 

The words were but out of his mouth when John Harmon 
lifted his finger, and Sloppy, who was now close to Wegg, 
backed to Wegg’s back, stooped, grasped his coat-collar be- 
hind with both hands, and deftly swung him up like a sack 
of flour. Mr. Sloppy’s instructions had been to deposit his 
burden in the road ; but a scavenger’s cart happening to 
stand unattended at the corner, with its little ladder planted 
against the wheel, Mr. S. found it impossible to resist the 
temptation of shooting Mr. Silas Wegg into the cart’s con- 
tents — a somewhat difficult feat, achieved with great dex- 
terity, and with a prodigious splash. 

CHAPTER LVII. 

H OW Bradley Headstone had been racked and riven in 
his mind since the quiet evening when by the river- 
side he had risen, as it were, out of the ashes of the barge- 
man, none but he could have told. Not even he could have 
told, for such misery can only be felt. 

Time went by, and no visible suspicion dogged him ; 
time went by, and in such public accounts of the attack as 
were renewed at intervals, he began to see Mr. Lightwood 
(who acted as lawyer for the injured man) straying further 
from the fact, going wider of the issue, and evidently slack- 
ening in his zeal. By degrees, a glimmering of the cause 
of this began to break on Bradley’s sight. Then came the 
chance encounter with Mr. Milvey at the railway station. 

He saw that through his desperate attempt to separate 
those two for ever, he had been made the means of uniting 
them. That he had dipped his hands in blood, to mark him- 
self a miserable fool and tool. That Eugene Wray burn, for 
his wife’s sake, set him aside and left him to crawl along 
his blasted course. 

One winter day when a slight fall of snow was feathering 
the sills and frames of the schoolroom windows, he stood at 
his blackboard, crayon in hand, about to commence with 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


341 


a class ; when, reading in the countenances of those boys 
that there was something wrong, and that they seemed in 
alarm for him, he turned his eyes to the door towards 
which they faced. He then saw a slouching man of forbid- 
ding appearance standing in the midst of the school, with 
a bundle under his arm ; and saw that it was Eiderhood. 

He sat down on a stool which one of his boys put for him, 
and he had a passing knowledge that he was in danger of 
falling, and that his face was becoming distorted. But the 
fit went off for that time, and he wiped his mouth, and stood 
up again. 

“Beg your pardon, governor! By your leave!” said 
Eiderhood, knuckling his forehead, with a chuckle and a 
leer. “ What place may this be ? ” 

“ This is a school.” 

“Where young folks learns wot’s right?” said Eider- 
hood, gravely nodding. “ Beg your pardon ! governor ! By 
your leave ! But who teaches this school ? ” 

“Ido.” 

“ You’re the master, are you, learned governor ? ” 

“Yes. I am the master.” 

“ And a lovely thing it must be,” said Eiderhood, “ fur to 
learn young folks wot’s right, and fur to know wot they 
know wot you do it. Beg your pardon, learned governor ! 
By your leave ! — That there blackboard ; wot’s it for ? ” 

‘ It is for drawing on, or writing on.” 

“ Is it though ! ” said Eiderhood. “ Who’d have thought 
it, from the looks on it ! Would you be so kind as to write 
your name upon it, learned governor ? ” 

Bradley hesitated for a moment ; but placed his usual sig- 
nature, enlarged, upon the board. 

“ I ain’t a learned character myself,” said Eiderhood, sur- 
veying the class, “ but I do admire learning in others. I 
should dearly like to hear these here young folks read that 
there name off, from the writing.” 

The arms of the class went up. At the miserable master’s 
nod, the shrill chorus arose : “ Bradley Headstone ! ” 

“ Ho ? ” cried Eiderhood. “You don’t mean it ? Head- 
stone ! Why, that’s in a church-yard. Hooroar for another 
turn ! ” 


342 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


Another tossing of arms, another nod, and another shrill 
chorus : “ Bradley Headstone ! ” 

“I’ve got it now ! ” said Biderhood, after attentively list- 
ening. “ Might you be acquainted, learned governor, 
with a person of about your own heighth and breadth, and 
wot ’ud pull down in a scale about your own weight, answer- 
ing to a name sounding summat like T’otherest ? ” 

With a desperation in him that made him perfectly quiet, 
though his jaw was heavily squared; with his eyes upon 
Biderhood ; and with traces of quickened breathing in his 
nostrils; the schoolmaster replied in a suppressed voice, 
after a pause : “ I think I know the man you mean.” 

“ I thought you knowed the man I mean, learned gover- 
nor. I want the man.” 

With a half glance around him at his pupils, Bradley re- 
turned : “ Do you suppose he is here ? ” 

“ Begging your pardon, learned governor, and by your 
leave,” said Biderhood, with a laugh, “ how could I suppose 
he’s here, when there’s nobody here but you, and me, and 
these young lambs wot you’re a learning on ? But he is most 
excellent company, that man, and I want him to come and 
see me at my lock, up the river.” 

“I’ll tell him so.” 

“ D’ye think he’ll come ? ” asked Biderhood. 

“ I am sure he will.” 

“ Having got your word for him,” said Biderhood, “ I 
shall count upon him. P’raps you’d so fur obleege me, learn- 
ed governor, as tell him that if he don’t come precious soon. 
I’ll look him up.” 

“ He shall know it.” 

“Thankee. As I says a while ago,” pursued Biderhood, 
changing his hoarse tone and leering round upon the class 
again, “ though not a learned character my own self, I do 
admire learning in others, to be sure ! Being here and hav- 
ing met with your kind attention. Master, might I, afore I 
go, ask a question of these here young lambs of yourn ? ” 

“ If it is in the way of school,” said Bradley, always sus- 
taining his dark look at the other, and speaking in his sup- 
pressed voice, “you may.” 

“ Oh ! It’s in the way of school I ” cried Biderhood. “ I’U 


OUB MUTUAL FRIEND. 


343 


pound it, Master, to be in the way of school. Wot’s the di- 
wisions of water, my lambs ? Wot sorts of water is there 
on the land ? ” 

Shrill chorus : “ Seas, rivers, lakes, and ponds.” 

Seas, rivers, lakes, and ponds,” said Riderhood. 

They’ve got all the lot. Master! Slowed if I shouldn’t 
have left out lakes, never having clapped eyes upon one, to 
my knowledge. Seas, rivers, lakes, and ponds. Wot is 
it, lambs, as they ketches in seas, rivers, lakes, and ponds ? ” 

Shrill chorus (with some contempt for the ease of the 
question) : “ Fish I ” 

“ Grood agin ! ” said Riderhood. But wot else is it, my 
lambs, as they sometimes ketches in rivers ? ” 

Chorus at a loss. One shrill voice : “ Weed ! ” 

“ Grood agin I ” cried Riderhood. “ But it ain’t weed 
neither. You’ll never guess, my dears. Wot is it, besides 
fish, as they sometimes ketches in rivers? Well! I’ll tell 
you. It’s suits o’ clothes.” 

Bradley’s face changed. 

‘‘ Leastways, lambs,” said Riderhood, observing him out 
of the corners of his eyes, “ that’s wot I my own self some- 
times ketches in rivers. For strike me blind, my lambs, if I 
didn’t ketch in a river the wery bundle under my arm ! ” 

The class looked at the master, as if appealing from the ir- 
regular entrapment of this mode of examination. The mas- 
ter looked at the examiner, as if he would have torn him to 
pieces. 

I ask your pardon, learned governor,” said Riderhood, 
smearing his sleeve across his mouth as he laughed with a 
relish, tain’t fair to the lambs, I kn(>w. It wos a bit of fun 
of mine. But upon my soul I drawed this here bundle out 
of a river! It’s a bargeman’s suit of clothes. You see, it 
had been sunk there by the man as wore it, and I got it up.” 

How do you know it was sunk by the man who wore 
it ? ” asked Bradley. 

’Cause I see him do it,” said Riderhood. 

They looked at each other. Bradley, slowly withdraw- 
ing his eyes, turned his face to the blackboard and slowly 
wiped his name out. 

‘‘A heap of thanks, Master,” said Riderhood, “for be- 


344 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


stowing so much of your time, and of the lambses’ time, up- 
on a man as hasn’t got no other recommendation to you than 
being a honest man. Wishing to see at my lock up the riv- 
er, the person as we’ve spoke of, and as you’ve answered for, 
I takes my leave of the lambs and of their learned governor 
both.” 

The next day but one was Saturday, and a holiday. Brad- 
ley rose early, and set out on foot for Plaslnvater Weir Mill 
Lock. He rose so early that it was not yet light when he 
began his journey. Before extinguishing the candle by 
which he had dressed himself, he made a little parcel of his 
decent silver watch and its decent guard, and wrote inside 
the paper : “ Kindly take care of these for me.” He then ad- 
dressed the parcel to Miss Beecher, and left it on the most 
protected corner of the little seat in her little porch. 

It was a cold hard easterly morning when he latched the 
garden gate and turned away. He took heed of nothing 
but the ice, the snow, and the distance, until he saw a light, 
which he knew gleamed from the lock-house window. 

The light was the joint product of a fire and a candle. Be- 
tween the two, with his feet on the iron fender, sat Rider- 
hood, pipe in mouth. 

He looked up with a surly nod when his visitor came in. 
His visitor looked down with a surly nod. His outer cloth- 
ing removed, the visitor then took a seat on the opposite side 
of the fire. 

Riderhood looked hard at his hands and his pockets, ap- 
parently as a precautionary measure lest he should have any 
w^eapon about him. But he now leaned forward, turning 
the collar of his waistcoat with an inquisitive finger, and 
asked, “ Why, where’s your watch ? ” 

“ I have left it behind.” 

“ I want it ; but it can be fetched ; I’ve took a fancy to it.” 

Bradley answered with a contemptuous laugh. 

“ I want it,” repeated Riderhood, and I mean to have it.” 

“ That is what you want of me, is it ? ” 

No,” said Riderhood, “ it’s on’y part of what I want of 
you. I want money of you.” 

“ Anything else ? ” 

“ Everything else ! ” roared Riderhood, in a very loud and 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


345 


furious way. “Look here, Bradley Headstone, Master, 
You might have split the T’other governor to chips and 
wedges, without my caring, except that I might have come 
upon you for a glass or so now and then. Else why have to 
do with you at all ? But when you copied my clothes, and 
when you copied my neckhankercher, and when you shook 
blood upon me after you had done the trick, you did wot I’ll 
be paid for and paid heavy for. If it come to be throwed up- 
on you, you was to be ready to throw it upon me, was you ? 
Where else but in Plashwater Weir Mill Lock was there a 
man dressed according as described? Where else but in 
Plashwater Weir Mill Lock was there a man as had had 
words with him coming through in his boat ? Look at the 
Lock-keeper in Plashwater Weir Mill Lock, in them same 
answering clothes and with that same answering red neck- 
hankercher, and see whether his clothes happens to be 
bloody or not. Yes, they do happen to be bloody. Ah, you 
sly devil ! ” 

Bradley, very white, sat looking at him in silence. 

“ But two could play at your game,” said Riderhood. “ I 
don’t care a curse for the T’other governor, alive or dead, but 
I care a many curses for my own self. And as you laid your 
plots agin me and was a sly devil agin me, I’ll be paid for it — 
I’ll be paid for it — till I’ve drained you dry ! ” 

“You can’t get blood out of a stone, Riderhood.” 

“ I can get money out of a schoolmaster though.” 

“ You can’t get out of me what is not in me. You can’t 
wrest from me what I have not got. Mine is but a poor call- 
ing. You have had more than two guineas from me, al- 
ready. Do you know how long it has taken me (allowing 
for a long and arduous training) to earn such a sum ? ” 

“ I don’t know, nor I don’t care. Yours is a ’spectable 
calling. To save your ’spectability, it’s worth your while to 
pawn every article of clothes you’ve got, sell every stick in 
your house, and beg and borrow every penny you can get 
trusted with. When you’ve done that and handed over. I’ll 
leave you. Hot afore.” 

“ How do you mean, you’ll leave me ? ” 

“ I mean as I’ll keep you company, wherever you go, 
when yoti go away from here. Let the lock take care of it- 
self. I’ll take care of you, once I’ve got you.” 


346 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


“ Riderhood,” said Bradley, after a long silence, drawing 
out his purse and putting it on the table, Say I part with 
this, which is all the money I have ; say I let you have my 
watch ; say that every quarter, when I draw my salary, I 
pay you a certain portion of it.” 

Say nothink of the sort. You’ve got away once, and I 
won’t run the chance agin. I’ll have one settlement with 
you for good and all.” 

“ Riderhood, I am a man who has lived a retired life. I 
have no resources beyond myself. I have absolutely no 
friends.” 

That’s a lie,” said Riderhood. You’ve got one friend 
as I knows of ; one as is good for a savings-bank book, or I’m 
a blue monkey ! I went into the wrong shop, fust, last 
Thursday. Found myself among the young ladies, by 
G-eorge ! Over the young ladies, I see a Missis. That Missis 
is sweet enough upon you. Master, to sell herself up, slap, to 
get you out of trouble. Make her do it then.” 

“ You spoke to the mistress, did you ? ” inquired Bradley. 

Poof! Yes,” said Riderhood. “ I didn’t say much to 
her. She was put in a fluster by my dropping in among the 
young ladies (I never did set up for a lady’s man), and she 
took me into her parlor to hope as there was nothink wrong. 
I tells her, ‘ 0 no, nothink wrong. The master’s my wery 
good friend.’ But I see how the land laid, and that she was 
comfortable off. She couldn’t live more handy to you than 
she does, and when I goes home with you (as of course I am 
a-going), I recommend you to clean her out without loss of 
time. You can marry her arter you and me have come to a 
settlement. She’s nice-looking, and I know you can’t be 
keeping company with no one else, having been so lately 
disapinted in another quarter.” 

Not. one other word did Bradley utter all that night. 
Rigid before the fire, as if it were a charmed flame that was 
turning him old, he sat, with the dark lines deepening in his 
face, its stare becoming more and more haggard, its surface 
turning whiter and whiter as if it were being overspread 
with ashes, and the very texture and color of his hair degen- 
erating. 

Not until the late daylight made the w.indow transparent. 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 347 

did this decaying statue move. Then it slowly arose, and 
sat in the window looking out. 

Eiderhood had kept his chair all night. He was making 
some disorderly preparations for coffee, when Bradley came 
from the window and put on his outer coat and hat. 

“ Hadn’t us better have a bit o’ breakfast afore we start ? ” 
said Eiderhood. It ain’t good to freeze a empty stomach, 
Master.” 

Without a sign to show that he heard, Bradley walked out 
of the lock-house. Catching up from the table a piece of 
bread, and taking his bargeman’s bundle under his arm, Eid- 
erhood immediately followed him. Bradley turned tow ards 
London. Eiderhood caught him up, and walked at his side. 

The two men trudged on, side by side, in silence, full three 
miles. Suddenly, Bradley turned to retrace his course. 
Eiderhood turned likewise, and they went back side by side. 

Bradley re-entered the lock-house. So did Eiderhood. 
Bradley sat down in the window. Eiderhood warmed him- 
self at the fire. After an hour or more, Bradley abruptly got 
up again, and again went out, but this time turned the other 
way. Eiderhood was close after him, caught him up in a 
few paces, and walked at his side. 

This time, as before, when he found his attendant not to 
be shaken off, Bradley suddenly turned back. This time, as 
before, Eiderhood turned back along with him. But, not 
this time, as before, did they go into the lock-house, for 
Bradley came to a stand on the snow-covered turf by the 
lock, looking up the river and down the river. Navigation 
was impeded by the frost, and the scene was a mere white 
and yellow desert. 

“ Come, come. Master,” urged Eiderhood, at his side. 
“ This is a dry game. And where’s the good of it ? Y ou can’t 
get rid of me, except by coming to a settlement. I am a-go- 
ing along with you wherever you go.” 

Without a word of reply, Bradley passed quickly from 
him over the wooden bridge on the lock gates. Why, 
there’s even less sense in this move than t’other,” said Eider- 
hood, following. “The Weir’s there, and you’ll have to 
come back, you know.” 

Without taking the least notice, Bradley leaned his body 


348 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


against a post, and there rested with his eyes cast down. 
“ Being brought here,” said Riderhood, “ I’ll turn it to some 
use by changing my gates.” With a rattle and a rush of 
water, he then swung-to the lock gates that were standing 
open. So, both sets of gates were for the moment closed. 

“You’d better by far be reasonable, Bradley Headstone, 
Master,” said Riderhood, passing him, “or I’ll drain you all 
the dryer for it, when we do settle. — Ah ! W ould you ! ” 
Bradley had caught him round the body. He seemed to 
be girdled with an iron ring. They were on the brink of the 
lock, about midway between the two sets of gates. 

“ Let go ! ” said Riderhood, “ or I’ll get my knife out and 
slash you wherever I can cut you. Let go ! ” 

Bradley was drawing to the lock-edge. Riderhood was 
drawing away from it. It was a strong grapple, and a fierce 
struggle, arm and leg. Bradley got him round, with his 
back to the lock, and still worked him backward. 

“ Let go ! ” said Riderhood. “ Stop ! What are you try- 
ing at? You can’t drown Me. Ain’t I told you that a man 
as has come through drowning can never be drowned ? I 
can’t be drowned.” 

“ I can be ! ” returned Bradley, in a desperate, clenched 
voice. “ I am resolved to be. I’ll hold you living, and I’ll 
hold you dead. Come down ! ” 

Riderhood went over into the smooth pit, backwards, and 
Bradley Headstone upon him. When the two were found, 
lying under the ooze and scum behind one of the rotting 
gates, Riderhood’s hold had relaxed, probably in falling, and 
his eyes were staring upward. But he was girdled still 
with Bradley’s iron ring, and the rivets of the iron ring held 
tight. 


CHAPTER LYIII. 

M r. AHD MRS. JOHN HARMON’S first delightful oc- 
cupation was, to set all matters right that had strayed 
in any way wrong, or that might, could, would, or should 
"have strayed in any way wrong, while their name was in 
abeyance. In tracing out affairs for which John’s fictitious 
death was to be considered in any way responsible, they 


OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. 


349 


used a very broad and free construction; regarding, for in- 
stance, the dolls’ dressmaker as having a claim on their pro- 
tection, because of her association with Mrs. Eugene Wray- 
burn, and because of Mrs. Eugene’s old association, in her 
turn, with the dark side of the story. It followed that the 
old man, Riah, as a good and serviceable friend to both, was 
not to be disclaimed. Nor even Mr. Inspector, as having 
been trepanned into an industrious hunt on a false scent. 

In all their arrangements of such nature, Mr. and Mrs. 
John Harmon derived much assistance from their eminent 
solicitor, Mr. Mortimer Lightwood; who laid about him 
professionally with such unwonted dispatch and intention, 
that a piece of work was vigorously pursued as soon as cut 
out; whereby Young Blight was acted on as by that trans- 
atlantic dram which is poetically named An Eye-Opener, 
and found himself staring at real clients instead of out of 
window. The accessibility of Riah proving very useful as 
to a few hints towards the disentanglement of Eugene’s af- 
fairs, Lightwood applied himself with infinite zest to attack- 
ing and harassing Mr. Eledgeby ; who, discovering himself 
in danger of being blown into the air by certain explosive 
transactions in which he had been engaged, and having been 
sufficiently flayed under his beating, came to a parley and' 
asked for quarter. The harmless Twemlow profited by the 
conditions entered into, though he little thought it. Mr. 
Riah unaccountably melted ; waited in person on him over 
the stable yard in Duke Street, St. James’s, no longer raven- 
ing but mild, to inform him that payment of interest as here- 
tofore, but henceforth at Mr. Lightwood’s offices, would 
appease his Jewish rancor; and departed with the secret 
that Mr. John Harmon had advanced the money and be- 
come the creditor. 

Mrs. Wilfer’s first visit to the Mendicant’s bride at the 
new abode of Mendicancy, was a grand event. The car- 
riage was sent for Ma, who entered it with a bearing wor- 
thy of the occasion, accompanied, rather than supported, by 
Miss Lavinia, who altogether declined to recognize the ma- 
ternal majesty. Mr. Gfeorge Sampson meekly followed. 
Pa had been sent for into the City, on the very day of taking 


350 


CONDENSED CLASSICS. 


possession, and had been stunned with astonishment, and 
brought to, and led about the house by one ear, to behold its 
various treasures, and had been enraptured and enchanted. 
Pa had also been appointed Secretary, and had been en- 
joined to give instant notice of resignation to Chicksey, 
Yeneering, and Stobbles, for ever and ever. 

But the greatest event of all, in the new life of Mr. and 
Mrs. John Harmon, was a visit from Mr. and Mrs. Eugene 
Wray burn. Sadly wan and worn was the once gallant Eu- 
gene, and walked resting on his wife’s arm, and leaning 
heavily upon a stick. But he was daily growing stronger 
and better, and it was declared by the medical attendants 
that he might not be much disfigured by-and-by. It was a 
grand event, indeed, when Mr. and Mrs. Eugene Wrayburn 
came to stay at Mr. and Mrs. John Harmon’s house ; Avhere, 
by the way, Mr. and Mrs. Boffin (exquisitely happy, and 
daily cruising about, to look at shops) were likewise staying 
indefinitely. 


THE END. 




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